Celebrated Cases of Judge Dee = Dee Goong an by Robert Hans Van Gulik (1976, Paperback, Unabridged)

Brilliant book, a wonderful window into Imperial China- actually a translation of old Chinese detective stories. The characters are well-drawn, the plot is remarkable in that it is "modern" while still being of the 6th century. The Chinese evidently discovered detective fiction about 700 years before we Occidentals got around to it. Van Gulik followed this up with several more books, most of them excellent, but this stands apart as something a little important- in addition to being very, very entertaining.

I bought this book as a gift for a friend, having long ago discovered Judge Dee the same way: a friend gave me this same book.