Foul Lady Fortune

Orion is the attractive playboy son of General Hong, a military leader accused of colluding with the Japanese in their bid to take over China. Orion defends his father’s innocence, but he’s deeply troubled by the way his family is unraveling as a result. Like Rosalind, Orion is a Nationalist spy and is trying to atone for past wrongs. When he’s paired with Rosalind (Lady Fortune) on a surveillance mission, he develops a strong attraction to her. Eventually, he falls in love with her and expresses a desire to continue as her spy partner indefinitely.

For much of the novel, Orion has no idea that Rosalind is the most lethal assassin working for the Nationalists. He also has no clue that he himself is a sleeper agent being used to carry out chemical poisonings in Shanghai. He’s devastated to realize that his own mother is the scientist developing a super-solider drug and that she has used her own son as a guinea pig. The novel ends with Orion still under her thrall, with the suggestion that Rosalind will rescue him at some point in the future.

Liza is the final surviving member of the Russian White Flower gang. She’s little more than a teenager but is already an experienced Communist agent. Like Rosalind, she has been sent to surveil the Japanese Seagreen Press, but she has little interest in a boring desk job. Her shared history with Rosalind makes her an ally more than an adversary. At many points in the story, she ferrets out information and comes to the rescue of the Nationalist agents.

Liza’s alliance with the Communists is a simple matter of convenience since the Nationalists don’t trust anyone formerly associated with the White Flowers. As a result, she successfully plays both factions to engineer her own survival. However, she’s dedicated to protecting her adopted homeland too. By the novel’s end, she seems equally disgusted with the self-serving behavior of political parties and is on the verge of rejecting all the factions.

Phoebe is Orion’s precocious teenage sister. She’s 17 and the baby of the family. Although nobody considers her competent enough to be a full-fledged agent, she manages to involve herself in most of Orion’s spying activities, to her older brother’s exasperation. With the help of her beau, Silas, Phoebe ferrets out valuable facts that help Rosalind and Orion conduct their investigation. On two occasions, she engineers jailbreaks on their behalf as well. Not until the novel’s final page does the narrative reveal that Phoebe is the dreaded Communist assassin known as Priest. Despite her political allegiance, she kills those who are a threat to Orion, Liza, or Rosalind. Her behavior suggests that party factions matter less to her than family.

Silas is a 17-year-old spy who has had a crush on Phoebe since they were children. He’s acting as a double agent embedded in the Communist party. For the most part, Silas is a willing accomplice to whatever seemingly hare-brained scheme Phoebe concocts. He’s her chauffeur and escort for most of the novel, but he also provides valuable information to Rosalind and Orion in their investigation of Seagreen Press. While his political motivations aren’t always clear, Silas’s dominant characteristic is his devotion to Phoebe.

Celia is Rosalind’s younger sister. Although she was born anatomically male, Celia identifies as female. She’s romantically involved with Oliver Hong, and both are Communist agents stationed at a location close to the warehouse where the chemical experiments are taking place. Like many other characters in the novel, Celia’s emotional commitment to her sister and to Oliver take precedence over her political allegiance. She provides information to her sibling when necessary, even though her actions run contrary to her party’s agenda. For Celia, love matters more than politics, and she always acts accordingly.

Oliver is Orion’s tight-lipped elder brother. Unlike his sibling, he believes that General Hong is guilty of treason and dissociates himself from his family. He’s an experienced Communist agent who keeps secrets from everyone. Celia is particularly troubled by Oliver’s refusal to trust her. However, Oliver’s motives are similar to Celia’s in that he cares too much for her to put her life at risk. Oliver finds himself in a conflicted position because he knows of his mother’s experiments but refuses to believe that she’d experiment on his younger brother. In addition, he fails to reveal that he’s the handler for Priest. Thus, he’s alienated from his parents and brother while allying himself with Communism and his younger sister. This balancing act is very difficult to sustain. Unlike Celia, however, Oliver puts the party ahead of his emotions.

Dao Feng is Rosalind’s 38-year-old handler. He’s an experienced Nationalist agent who takes her under his wing and trains her to be an assassin. Rosalind trusts Dao and regards him as a father figure. Not until the end of the novel does the narrative reveal that Dao is also a double agent. He fakes a chemical attack on himself to avoid detection while he defects back to the Communist side. At the end of the novel, he’s in conversation with Priest, implying that they’re allies and setting up the possibility of conflict with Rosalind in future novels in the series.

Lao Lao is the grandmotherly figure who owns the apartment building where Rosalind lives. She’s also a Nationalist agent. While Lao Lao seems maternal and harmless, she’s capable of brewing antidotes to poison. Her behavior as a member of the party is very pragmatic and low-key. She knows all of Rosalind’s secrets but never uses those facts against her. Instead, she’s a stabilizing force in Rosalind’s otherwise precarious existence.

General Hong appears only briefly in the novel, though both his sons keenly feel his presence. The general’s trial for treason stirs up controversy. Even though he’s cleared of the charges, he has been convicted in the court of public opinion. He has also been tried by both his sons. Oliver believes he’s guilty, while Orion insists that he’s innocent. Either way, his actions have diminished the family’s standing. At the end of the novel, the narrative reveals that the general has been colluding with the Japanese. If they take over the country, he’ll receive an impressive military command. This is yet another story arc that will continue in future books in the series.

Like her husband, Lady Hong is a shadowy figure throughout much of the novel. She’s presumed to have retired to the country to escape the bad press associated with the general. Instead, the narrative reveals, she’s a scientist intent on developing a chemical to create an army of unkillable soldiers. Her political allegiance is as fluid as her husband’s. When the Nationalists cut her funding, she happily approaches the Japanese and colludes with them. Lady Hong’s pragmatism isn’t limited to politics. She’s willing to experiment on her own son to develop a super serum. By the end of the novel, it appears that she has succeeded in turning Orion into a mindless killing machine. Again, her actions and their consequences will only be fully developed in future books in the series.