9tail Fox is a 2005

2005 in literature

The year 2005 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Events:*February 25 - Canada Reads selects Rockbound by Frank Parker Day as the novel to be read across the nation....

 novel

Novel

A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

 by Jon Courtenay Grimwood

Jon Courtenay Grimwood

Jon Courtenay Grimwood is a British science fiction and fantasy author.He was born in Valletta, Malta, grew up in Britain, Southeast Asia and Norway in the 1960s and 1970s. He studied at Kingston College, then worked in publishing and as a freelance writer for magazines and newspapers including The...

.

Plot summary

The plot centres around Bobby Zha, a Sergeant

Sergeant

Sergeant is a rank used in some form by most militaries, police forces, and other uniformed organizations around the world. Its origins are the Latin serviens, "one who serves", through the French term Sergent....

 at the fictional SFPD Chinatown

Chinatown, San Francisco, California

San Francisco's Chinatown is the oldest Chinatown in North America and the largest Chinese community outside Asia. Since its establishment in 1848, it has been highly important and influential in the history and culture of ethnic Chinese immigrants to the United States and North America...

 station in San Francisco. The claimed shooting of a burglar by eleven-year-old Natalie Persikov conflicts with Zha's intuition on the matter, but before he has a real chance to investigate he is shot himself.

After meeting the Jinwei hu (the nine-tailed fox

Kitsune

is the Japanese word for fox. Foxes are a common subject of Japanese folklore; in English, kitsune refers to them in this context. Stories depict them as intelligent beings and as possessing magical abilities that increase with their age and wisdom. Foremost among these is the ability to assume...

 of the title) while dead, Bobby wakes up in a hospital. However, there are a few surprises for him on waking; not least that apparently he isn't Bobby Zha anymore. The doctors tell him he's in New York

New York

New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...

, not San Francisco; he was never shot; and that he's Robert Van Berg, sole survivor of a car crash that killed both his parents and put him into a coma

Coma

In medicine, a coma is a state of unconsciousness, lasting more than 6 hours in which a person cannot be awakened, fails to respond normally to painful stimuli, light or sound, lacks a normal sleep-wake cycle and does not initiate voluntary actions. A person in a state of coma is described as...

 since he was fifteen. Now adult and sole inheritor of his family's considerable fortune, Bobby wastes no time in getting back to the West Coast

West Coast of the United States

West Coast or Pacific Coast are terms for the westernmost coastal states of the United States. The term most often refers to the states of California, Oregon, and Washington. Although not part of the contiguous United States, Alaska and Hawaii do border the Pacific Ocean but can't be included in...

 to investigate.

In between looking into the case of his own murder, finding out what really happened at the Persikov's house and following up the leads from his contacts among the homeless of San Francisco, Bobby becomes increasingly concerned over his own identity. Changing identities at a whim — an FBI agent, a CIA investigator, a special forces agent direct from the White House — he questions his old acquaintances about Sergeant Zha, finding out more about himself than he ever knew.

The novel is set "a few years in the future", and frequently references Soviet author

Russian literature

Russian literature refers to the literature of Russia or its émigrés, and to the Russian-language literature of several independent nations once a part of what was historically Russia or the Soviet Union...

 Mikhail Bulgakov

Mikhail Bulgakov

Mikhaíl Afanásyevich Bulgákov was a Soviet Russian writer and playwright active in the first half of the 20th century. He is best known for his novel The Master and Margarita, which The Times of London has called one of the masterpieces of the 20th century.-Biography:Mikhail Bulgakov was born on...

. Grimwood notes in the Acknowledgments that "the choice of Persikov

The Fatal Eggs

The Fatal Eggs is a science-fiction novella by Mikhail Bulgakov, a Soviet novelist and playwright whose most famous work is The Master and Margarita. It was written in 1924 and first published in 1925...

 for Dr Misha's surname is entirely intentional."

Literary significance and reception

Booklist

Booklist

Booklist is a publication of the American Library Association that provides critical reviews of books and audiovisual materials for all ages. It is geared toward libraries and booksellers and is available in print or online...

 described the story in 9tail Fox as a "typical revenge story transformed into a story of personal redemption—and a darn good one at that." Publishers Weekly

Publishers Weekly

Publishers Weekly, aka PW, is an American weekly trade news magazine targeted at publishers, librarians, booksellers and literary agents...

said that "Grimwood does sustain interest with a premise that could have fallen flat in lesser hands."