Blindsided by divorce, a suspicious housewife hires a private investigator, thereby setting off a chain of events that ends in murder – and the killer is her ex-husband! Even more improbably, her ex-husband then kills himself in jail. What was he hiding? And why was it so important that two lives were sacrificed to keep it secret?
When her husband Ming-jen demands a divorce, he only gives one excuse – “my love for you has died” – but Cheng-fang isn’t buying it. Suspicious by nature, she hires a private investigator to tail him.
Over the course of the divorce proceedings, Ming-jen unexpectedly yields custody of their two children. Gradually, further suspicious details come to light: Ming-jen has secretly changed his name, and now sports a tattoo of a raven on his back; he has shut down his software company, but continues to rent an office; increasingly, he avoids coming home, and frequently spends his nights elsewhere… he might not be having an affair, but he’s definitely up to something!
One evening, Ming-jen comes home bloody and bruised. A month later, he is accused of murder, and the victim is an employee of the private detective hired to keep tabs on him. Cheng-fang visits Ming-jen in jail, and in a desperate whisper he begs her to find one of their son’s games. The next day, Cheng-fang is notified that Ming-jen has killed himself.
Confused and alone, Cheng-fang struggles to connect the dots. What’s hidden in the game that Ming-jen was so concerned about? What business was Ming-jen mixed up in? And why was it so important that someone would stop at nothing – not even the sacrifice of two lives – to keep it secret?
The “elephants” of the book’s title refer to the problems in a marriage that we pretend not to see. With an eye for the absurd comedy of marriage, family, and divorce, author Hua Po-Jung takes the story of an ordinary housewife facing an impending divorce, and spins it into a murder mystery that probes the dark recesses of our closest relationships and reveals our inescapably human needs and desires.