Year of the Horseshoe Bat

Chia Pao-yu, the Beijing University democracy activist, was not executed after the June 1989 Tiananmen Square repression, as was rumored in the prequel, Year of the Earth Serpent Changing Colors. Instead, he escaped to Paris, where he lives in exile during the years of the Bataclan terrorist attacks, the Yellow Vest protests, and the COVID-19 (or Horseshoe Bat) pandemic. Chia works for the Foundation for Human Rights Forever under the direction of the heiress, Bereft Laplante--who, as he belatedly learns, had helped finance his escape from China, but who also funds questionable activities not related to purely humanitarian causes. With Foundation support, Chia participates in the protests in Hong Kong before publishing his Planetary Manifesto. And after taking part in an international conference on the "Future of China" in Washington DC, he warns of the rise of Chinese-inspired authoritarianism that seeks to subvert American and European democracies. At the same time, he fears the real possibility of war--if the Balding Eagle and the Red Dragon cannot eventually see eye to eye. Forced to quit the Foundation after Laplante sexually assaults him, and showing signs he is losing his sanity, Chia mysteriously disappears in a suspected trade-off for a Western spy held by Beijing--at least that is the official story.