Following clues found in a letter, a struggling writer begins investigating a case that has gone cold for thirty years: a murder involving a missing human cornea and a poisoning incident at a high school. Soon, however, he becomes entangled in the convoluted relationships and dark secrets of a wealthy family, and at the heart of it all – a murderous tendency that is passed from one generation to the next.
Yeh Sheng-Chiu, a struggling writer suffering from an eye condition, accepts a new commission from a book editor. Following the leads in a mysterious letter, Yeh begins to investigate a murder case that’s been cold for thirty years, hoping to write a true crime story that will revive his ailing career.
The letter tells the horrific tale of a blind and infertile woman, raised in darkness, who, after receiving an organ transplant from an executed prisoner, not only regains her sight, but also her womb. Moreover, the woman begins receiving portents of death in the form of a static-like haze that clouds her vision.
Though the letter reads like fiction, certain details are connected to a child-killer case from thirty years past – personal details that would not have been unavailable to the general public. Why would anyone take such pains to hide these facts within a fictional tale?
The trail of clues leads Yeh Sheng-Chiu to an elite high school in Taitung, where, three years earlier, a poisoning incident had occurred. The circumstances surrounding the incident, as well as the complex family relations of a mysterious cross-dressing student named Hua Pai-Yueh, all echo elements of the brutal murder case. Complicating matters are a pair of twins as different as night and day, a mistress hoping to gain a fortune after bearing a child, a student who poisons a friend for no apparent reason, and a barren mother who becomes a copy-cat killer, each carrying secrets they are reluctant to reveal. Before long, what started as a fact-finding trip lands Yeh Sheng-Chiu in a morass of unsolved mysteries.
Fish Eye, the latest novel from best-selling author Xerxes, draws source material from one of Taiwan’s most shocking death-penalty cases: the Chen-Kao Lien-Yeh murders, carried out with poisoned candy. Blending reality and fiction, Xerxes imaginatively enters the mind of the notorious female killer, challenging our conceptions of motherhood with a disturbing question: “Is it true that every mother must love her child? Or, might she choose not to love this living thing that tortured her for nine months before being painfully expelled from her body?”