Three Gorges Dam

Western China is a region where tension is ready to ignite, with Buddhist and Muslim minority communities poised to spark open conflict. Michael Brannigan is enjoying a successful stretch alongside the People's Republic of China. The country's leading energy adviser has lost his heart to Kylie Ryan, an Australian geophysicist, during a trip through Xinjiang Province. In Beijing, President Lao Ming is preparing a major summit with the United States, and news networks report that the Communist nation has overtaken America.

Brannigan travels aboard a train that follows Marco Polo's route across the continent. Once the Silk Road Express arrives at the far western edge of the Far East, his engineering team will help China tap some of the richest oil reserves in the world. He moves deeper into the Taklamakan Desert just as President Lao's motorcade nears the close of its parade, and the president is set to claim his triumph in the Hall of Purple Light within hours.

That calm breaks quickly. Militant youth groups and armed monks stir unrest across the country, and Brannigan's romance is swept up in the bloodshed and ends in tragedy. Communist forces and rebel groups fall into a cycle of escalating attacks and retaliation. Amid the upheaval, Brannigan is sent back to China on a secret assignment at the Three Gorges Dam, the largest hydroelectric plant on Earth. There he confronts his inner struggles and eventually finds a lasting sense of contentment.

The story is presented as a fast-moving political thriller, with the tagline that everything seems to be going well until something unimaginable occurs.