In the fevered, glittering chaos of Hong Kong, where East collides with West, modern business competes with ancient tradition for the world's richest rewards. In these opulent surroundings, animal traders fuel barbaric rituals and a billion dollar market in the name of superstition and greed.
From the dark core of the fabulous Golden Hill crawls a deadly menace, its name the Yellow Dragon, and its supreme overlord Sampson Ching, international drug star and trader in coveted flesh and blood of endangered animal species. Operation behind a veneer of respectability that masks a malevolent heart, Ching's empire reaches out through the torrid city of Manila and the pirate strongholds of the Sulu Sea to the world beyond.
When Sing Deverill, the fabled White Crane, crosses the path of the vicious Ching, her family is also swept into the grim darkness of his ever-lengthening shadow, seemingly never to escape.
As Hong Kong approaches the year of the tiger 1998, when a hundred years of British rule will have vanished into the night, its six million people look towards the hills of China and wonder what will be unveiled with the rising of Tiger Dawn.