David Rotenberg
Packed with insight and adventure, David Rotenberg’s critically acclaimed novels are driven by large and ominous forces at work. An exceptional storyteller of broad imagination David delivers intriguing and often gifted characters, exotic settings, and wonderfully nefarious plots.
CITY RISING, The Age of Dry Water. Book Four of The Shanghai Tetralogy. At Bay Press, October 23, 2025
David Rotenberg's much anticipated fourth book in his highly acclaimed Shanghai Tetralogy, CITY RISING, The Age of Dry Water, concludes this epic series. The Ivory Compact has endured the passage of time and tumult of history, and is on the brink of fulfilling the First Emperor's ancient vision. In a tour de force that takes readers from Baghdad to New York, Toronto, Bern and Madrid, all roads lead to the heights of modern day Shanghai -- a CITY RISING to meet the 21st Century. This Shanghai Tetralogy is historical fiction at its finest.
CITY RISING, The Age of Dry Water. Book Four of The Shanghai Tetralogy
At Bay Press, October 23, 2025
Nestled safely in its Baghdad hiding place, within the Abdullah family compound, the sacred Narwhal Tusk continues its voyage of revelation. Although there is no one to see it, China's First Emperor's prophetic plan continues to reveal itself as the Tusk rots slowly in the dry desert air of Mesopotamia. Then the great Tusk cracks. And as the alignment of the carved filigree on its surface re-forms, the classic characters spelling out "Age of Dry Water" arise. And although the Tusk remains in Baghdad, that phrase, as if carried on the mad desert winds, begins to circulate among the people of Shanghai to describe the time after Mao's arrival. A period of forty years when the City at the Bend in the River has been actively left to wither and die.
But now the 21st century has arrived.
CITY RISING, The Age of Dry Water, Book 4 of the Shanghai Tetralogy contains the final chapters of a prophecy foretold and how it came to be.
AVAILABLE AT INDIGO,
CANADA'S BOOKSTORE
"An epic [series] spanning thousands of years with larger-than-life characters and page-turning qualities."
–MacLeans
"Rotenberg’s take on the street life, bureaucracy, and sheer mass of Shanghai cleverly captures a wonderful, baffling city."
–Toronto Star
EVENTS
CELEBRATING THE LAUNCH OF
Queen Books was packed with friends and fans on June 27, 2024 to celebrate the launch of City Rising, Book One of the Shanghai Tetralogy.
