From Publishers Weekly
Location figures powerfully in Hillerman's newest novel, but it isn't the Southwest of his Navajo mysteries (Sacred Clowns, etc.), nor is this a Joe Leaphorn story. In April 1975, Moon Mathias, managing editor of a small-town Colorado newspaper, begins a redemptive journey that takes him first to Manila and then across the South China Sea to Cambodia, just as Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge begin their reign of terror. Moon's brother Ricky, owner of a helicopter transportation service based in Cambodia, has recently died in a jungle crash. Their mother receives word that Ricky's baby daughter is being smuggled out of Vietnam to the Philippines. After his mother has a heart attack in the Manila airport, Moon takes over her mission, but the child does not arrive. Finding and contacting Ricky's acquaintances, Moon fights time, political exigencies and his ignorance of his brother's life as he tries doggedly to locate his niece. The effort involves an appealing cast, including a wealthy Chinese man seeking his ancestors' bones, a Dutch woman searching for her missionary brother and Vietnamese refugees, who join Moon on a suspenseful, albeit not quite credible, journey to a series of villages along the Mekong River. In the end, as the title suggests, Moon finds more than he'd known was lost. Hillerman's mastery of setting and his compassionate, patient characterization are fully present in this tale, which is otherwise somewhat formulaic. 350,000 first printing; $300,000 ad/promo; HarperAudio. Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
Beginning with The Blessing Way (LJ 5/15/70), Hillerman has contrasted the contemporary cultures of Southwestern Native Americans with the dominant U.S. culture, creating best-selling mysteries in the process. Finding Moon is a dramatic departure, but it contains similar cultural contrasts. Set mostly in Vietnam during the fall of Saigon in 1975, it is the tale of Moon Mathias, self-described third-rate editor of a third-rate Colorado newspaper who, when his younger brother dies in Southeast Asia, discovers that there is a baby daughter missing somewhere in Vietnam. Reluctantly drawn into a search for the child, Moon is thereby drawn into a search for his own values. He leads a motley group of culturally varied misfits in his quest. With its vivid characters and a strong sense of place, trademarks of Hillerman mysteries, this tale will likely receive a strong reception in libraries everywhere.--Roland Person, Southern Illinois Univ. Lib., CarbondaleCopyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From AudioFile
This production wonderfully enhances Hillerman's tale of adventure and intrigue in Southeast Asia. The abridgment is subtle and restrained, removing only a minor subplot. A versatile actor, Sanders speaks with a cool, journalistic style appropriate to the character of narrator "Moon" Mathias. The newspaper articles, dispatches and news flashes that introduce each chapter place the story of Moon's search for his dead brother's missing daughter within the context of the last days of the Vietnam War. Voices for different characters are varied without being forced or clichŽd, even when Asian and female characters are portrayed. Appropriate music introduces and concludes each side. J.L. An AUDIOFILE Earphones Award winner. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine


From Booklist
Hillerman apologizes in his introduction for "wandering away" from his usual southwestern setting and from the extraordinarily popular Chee/Leaphorn duo, but the departure has resulted in what is undoubtedly one of Hillerman's most affecting, strongest, best-told tales yet. Set in 1975 at the end of the Vietnam War, the story follows Colorado newspaper editor Malcolm "Moon" Mathias, who labors under the misapprehension that he's "third-rate" --unsuccessful in his career, unlucky in love, and unwise about life. As the story begins, Moon gets a call from an L.A. hospital reporting that his mother has collapsed at the airport after suffering a serious heart attack. She was headed for the Philippines, so Moon figures her trip must have had something to do with his younger brother, Ricky, a former air force pilot who had set up his own transport business in Vietnam, then died in a plane crash. When Moon reaches L.A., he finds papers in his mother's purse that reveal Ricky was the father of a Vietnamese daughter--whom Moon's mother was obviously on her way to rescue. Of course, responsibility for finding the baby falls on Moon's capable shoulders. And it's on his heartrending, dangerous, surprising journey into his brother's past on the Mekong Delta that Moon eventually finds not only the child, but his own destiny. A tragic tale of war, a suspenseful adventure story, a gripping journey into man's deepest fears, and an engrossing love story. Emily Melton


Book Description
Tony Hillerman's bestselling Navajo mysteries have thrilled millions of readers with their taut, intricate plotting, sensitive, subtle characterizations and lyrical evocations of landscapes and cultures. Now he departs his trademark terrain and applies his talents to a story he has wanted to tell for decades about an ordinary man thrust into total chaos. Until the telephone call came for him on April 12, 1975, the world of Moon Mathias had settled into a predictable routine. He knew who he was. He was the disappointing son of Victoria Mathias, the brother of the brilliant, recently dead Ricky Mathias and a man who could be counted on to solve small problems. But the telephone caller was an airport security officer, and the news he delivered handed Moon a problem as large as Southeast Asia. His mother, who should be in her Florida apartment, is fighting for her life in a Los Angeles hospital -- stricken while en route to the Philippines to bring home a grandchild they hadn't known existed. The papers in her purse send Moon into a world totally strange to him. They lure him down the back streets of Manila, to a rural cockfight, into the odd Filipino prison on Palawan Island and finally across the South China Sea to where Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge is turning Cambodia into killing fields and Communist rockets are beginning to fall on the outskirts of Saigon. Finding Moon is many things: a latter-day adventure epic, a deftly orchestrated romance, an arresting portrait of an exotic realm engulfed in turmoil, and a neatly turned tale of suspense. Most of all, it is a singular story of how a plain, uncertain man finds his best self.


Download Description
"Loaded with e-book extras (not available in the print edition), including Tony Hillerman's running commentary on his work, his series heroes Leaphorn and Chee, and a special profile of the Navajo nation. Moon Mathias discovers his dead brother's baby daughter is waiting for him in Southeast Asia -- a child he didn't know existed. Finding her in the aftermath of the Vietnam War brings out a side of Moon he had forgotten he possessed. Tony Hillerman's bestselling Navajo mysteries have thrilled millions of readers with their taut, intricate plotting, sensitive, subtle characterizations and lyrical evocations of landscapes and cultures. Now he departs his trademark terrain and applies his talents to a story he has wanted to tell for decades about an ordinary man thrust into total chaos. Until the telephone call came for him on April 12, 1975, the world of Moon Mathias had settled into a predictable routine. He knew who he was. He was the disappointing son of Victoria Mathias, the brother of the brilliant, recently dead Ricky Mathias and a man who could be counted on to solve small problems. But the telephone caller was an airport security officer, and the news he delivered handed Moon a problem as large as Southeast Asia. His mother, who should be in her Florida apartment, is fighting for her life in a Los Angeles hospital -- stricken while en route to the Philippines to bring home a grandchild they hadn't known existed. The papers in her purse send Moon into a world totally strange to him. They lure him down the back streets of Manila, to a rural cockfight, into the odd Filipino prison on Palawan Island and finally across the South China Sea to where Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge is turning Cambodia into killing fields and Communist rockets are beginning to fall on the outskirts of Saigon. "


From the Publisher
Tony Hillerman's bestselling Navajo mysteries have thrilled millions of readers with their taut, intricate plotting, sensitive, subtle characterizations and lyrical evocations of landscapes and cultures. Now he departs his trademark terrain and applies his talents to a story he has wanted to tell for decades about an ordinary man thrust into total chaos. Until the telephone call came for him on April 12, 1975, the world of Moon Mathias had settled into a predictable routine. He knew who he was. He was the disappointing son of Victoria Mathias, the brother of the brilliant, recently dead Ricky Mathias and a man who could be counted on to solve small problems. But the telephone caller was an airport security officer, and the news he delivered handed Moon a problem as large as Southeast Asia. His mother, who should be in her Florida apartment, is fighting for her life in a Los Angeles hospital -- stricken while en route to the Philippines to bring home a grandchild they hadn't known existed. The papers in her purse send Moon into a world totally strange to him. They lure him down the back streets of Manila, to a rural cockfight, into the odd Filipino prison on Palawan Island and finally across the South China Sea to where Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge is turning Cambodia into killing fields and Communist rockets are beginning to fall on the outskirts of Saigon. Finding Moon is many things: a latter-day adventure epic, a deftly orchestrated romance, an arresting portrait of an exotic realm engulfed in turmoil, and a neatly turned tale of suspense. Most of all, it is a singular story of how a plain, uncertain man finds his best self.


About the Author
Tony Hillerman is past president of Mystery Writers of America and has received their Edgar and Grand Master Awards. His other honors include the Center for the American Indian's Ambassador Award, the Silver Spur Award for the best novel set in the West, the Navajo Tribe's Special Friend Award, the National Media Award from the American Anthropological Association, the Public Service Award from the U.S. Department of the Interior, the Nero Wolfe Award, the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Oklahoma Center for the Book, an honorary life membership in the Western Literature Association, and the Grand Prix de Littérature Policiére. In addition to his election to Phi Beta Kappa, Tony Hillerman has been named Doctor of Humane Letters at Arizona State University and at Oregon's Portland State University. He lives with his wife, Marie, in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

FROM OUR EDITORS

Hillerman trades in his usual American Southwest venue for Southeast Asia, 1975, in this novel of a man who is plunged into a series of life-altering events by his brother's death in Nam and the news of a baby girl fathered overseas.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Until the telephone call came for him on April 12, 1975, the world of Moon Mathias had settled into a predictable routine. He knew who he was. He was the disappointing son of Victoria Mathias, the brother of the brilliant, recently dead Ricky Mathias, and a man who could be counted on to solve small problems. But the telephone caller was an airport security officer, and the news he delivered handed Moon a problem as large as Southeast Asia. His mother, who should be in her Florida apartment, is fighting for her life in a Los Angeles hospital - stricken while en route to the Philippines to bring home a grandchild they hadn't known existed. The papers in her purse send Moon into a world totally strange to him. They lure him down the backstreets of Manila, to a rural cockfight, into the odd Filipino prison on Palawan Island, and finally across the South China Sea to where Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge is turning Cambodia into killing fields, and Communist rockets are beginning to fall on the outskirts of Saigon. Those he meets on this quest are as strange to Moon as Asia itself. There is Lum Lee, an elderly Chinese man who wants Moon to finish a job left unfinished by Ricky's death. But is Lee seeking ancestral bones as he claims, or a shipment of opium lost in the chaos of war? There is Mrs. van Winigaarden, a chic and sophisticated folk-art buyer who wants his help to save her missionary brother - if that is really her motive. Only Nguyen, warrior in a lost cause, with kill communists tattooed on his chest, seems easy to understand. But hardest of all for Moon to fathom is the mythical version of himself he finds among his brother's friends.

SYNOPSIS

Loaded with e-book extras (not available in the print edition), including Tony Hillerman's running commentary on his work, his series heroes Leaphorn and Chee, and a special profile of the Navajo nation.

Moon Mathias discovers his dead brother's baby daughter is waiting for him in Southeast Asia -- a child he didn't know existed.

FROM THE CRITICS

BookList - Emily Melton