J.I. Jung

J. I. Jung is a lifelong New Yorker of Chinese and European ancestry.

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His debut novel, Death Avenue, blends historical fiction and literary noir. The novel introduces Eddie Rum, a mixed-race veteran passing for white during the era of the Chinese Exclusion Act. Set in New York City in 1919, the novel explores a violent and rapidly changing city where crime, politics, family, and identity are inseparable.

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Eddie Rum grew, in part, from Jung’s own family history and from childhood Sundays spent in Chinatown with his grandparents. His research draws on historical newspapers, maps, photographs, archival materials, period fiction and film, and a lifetime of observing New York’s neighborhoods.

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Influenced by writers including Dashiell Hammett, Patricia Highsmith, Ernest Hemingway, Lawrence Block, Grace Paley, and Yukio Mishima, Jung is particularly interested in secrets—why people keep them, what they will do to protect them, and what those secrets ultimately cost.

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Death Avenue is the first novel in the Eddie Rum series.