Red Roulette, Desmond Shum
Red Roulette, Desmond Shum
9 Rating(s)
List: $25.99 | Sale: $18.20
Club: $12.99

Red Roulette
An Insider's Story of Wealth, Power, Corruption, and Vengeance in Today's China

Author: Desmond Shum

Narrator: Tim Chiou

Unabridged: 9 hr 22 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 09/07/2021


Synopsis

“THE BOOK CHINA DOESN’T WANT YOU TO READ.” —CNN​

SELECTED AS A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR by THE ECONOMIST and FINANCIAL TIMES

This “powerful and disturbing” (Bill Browder, author of Red Notice) New York Times bestseller is narrated by a man who, with his wife, Whitney Duan, rose to the top levels of power and wealth—and then fell out of favor. Whitney had been disappeared four years before, but this book led to her dramatic reemergence.

As Desmond Shum was growing up impoverished in China, he vowed his life would be different. Through hard work and sheer tenacity he earned an American college degree and returned to his native country to establish himself in business. There, he met his future wife, the highly intelligent and equally ambitious Whitney Duan who was determined to make her mark within China’s male-dominated society. Whitney and Desmond formed an effective team and, aided by relationships they formed with top members of China’s Communist Party, the so-called red aristocracy, he vaulted into China’s billionaire class. Soon they were developing the massive air cargo facility at Beijing International Airport, and they followed that feat with the creation of one of Beijing’s premier hotels. They were dazzlingly successful, traveling in private jets, funding multi-million-dollar buildings and endowments, and purchasing expensive homes, vehicles, and art.

But in 2017, their fates diverged irrevocably when Desmond, while residing overseas with his son, learned that his now ex-wife Whitney had vanished along with three coworkers.

This vivid, explosive memoir shows “how the Chinese government keeps business in line—and what happens when businesspeople overstep” (The New York Times) and is a “singular, highly readable insider account of the most secretive of global powers” (The Spectator).

About Desmond Shum

Desmond Shum, who was born in Shanghai and raised in Hong Kong, developed the largest air cargo logistics facility in China, the Beijing Airport Cargo Terminal. He also led the development of the Bulgari Hotel in Beijing. In addition, starting in the early 2000s, he was an early pioneer of philanthropy in China, gifting extensively both domestically and internationally. Desmond holds a bachelor’s degree in finance and accounting from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in the United States, and is a graduate of the joint-EMBA program of Northwestern University (US) and the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. 


Reviews

Goodreads review by Colin

This book is difficult to review because, while it is an unpleasant read written by a vain and contemptible plutocrat, it does put a spotlight on the significant problem the government of modern China has become. Too often the problem (at least in American political discourse) of China is lost in an......more

I'm a bit torn on how I want to rate this... On one hand, this is an incredibly unique memoir from a Chinese billionaire that made enormous sums of money from his connections to China's Red Aristocracy (members of the super rich elite class of the Communist Party). Along the way, he gossips and reve......more

Red Roulette is a rags-to-riches autobiography of entrepreneur and real estate developer Desmond Shum. Born in Shanghai in 1968 and raised in Hong Kong, Shum describes how his humble upbringing - which came from the fact that his grandfather was marked as a member of the low-ranking “black category”......more