Mr. China » (Spanish Language)

The idea of China has always exerted a pull on the adventurous type. There is a kind of entrepreneurial Westerner who just can't resist it: red flags, a billion bicycles, and the largest untapped market on earth. What more could they want? After the first few visits, they start to feel more in tune and experience the first stirrings of a fatal ambition: the secret hope of becoming the Mr. China of their time.

In the 1990s, China went through a miraculous transformation from a closed backwater to the workshop of the world. Many smart young men saw this transformation coming and mistook it for their destiny. Not a few rushed East to gain strategic footholds, plant their flags, and prosper. After all, the Chinese had numbers on their side: a seemingly endless population, a thirst for resources, and the tide of history. What they needed was Western knowledge and lots of capital. Or so it seemed ...

Mr. China tells the rollicking story of one man's encounter with the Chinese. Armed with hundreds of millions of dollars and a strong sense that he and his partners were—like missionaries of capitalism—descending into the industrial past to bring the Chinese into the modern world, Clissold got the education of a lifetime.

The ordinary Chinese workers, business owners, local bureaucrats, and party cadres Clissold encountered were some of the most committed, resourceful, and creative operators he would ever meet. They were happy to take the foreigner's money but resisted just about anything else. At every turn, the locals seemed one step ahead of Clissold's crew threatening to take the Westerners for all they were worth.

In the end, Mr.China isn't a tale of business or an expatriate's love for his adopted land. It's one man's coming-of-age story where he learns to respect and admire the nation he sought to conquer.

About the Author:

Tim Clissold was born in England and graduated from Cambridge University with degrees in physics and theoretical physics in 1982. He then joined Arthur Andersen and worked in London and Australia before moving to Hong Kong, where he developed a fascination with China. He moved to Beijing and studied Mandarin Chinese for two years before cofounding a private equity group that invested four hundred million dollars into China. He has been working in China for seventeen years and has traveled to almost every part of the country. He lives in Beijing with his wife and four children.

The Washington Post - Jonathan Yardley

This hugely entertaining book is the story of an ambitious young Brit (the author) who arrived in China in the late 1980s, fell in love with it and soon was seized by "the first stirrings of a fatal ambition: the secret hope of becoming the 'Mr. China' of [his] time, the zhongguo tong or 'Old China Hand' with the inside track in the Middle Kingdom."