This is subtitled 'The Untold Story of the Honorable Detective' but it is really something quite different from that. Huang explores Charlie Chan from a number of different angles, all the while circling th topic of Asians in America and how Chan might be seen to represent that experience at one point in time.
The book opens with a brief of biography of the man who Biggers loosely based his fictional detective on, Chang Apana. Apana is a great example of the early Asian experience in America--he was the son of a coolie in Hawaii, working for a family that took an interest in their employees (not enough to educate them, or even to teach them to read, but a cut above the average plantation owner of the time) and he was able to get a job with the Hawaian police. He had none of the physical attributes of Chan, but his ability to be present but not seen was one that Apana was well known for--this section of hte book was the best as far as I am concerned.
Huang goes on to explore the fictional character, Charlie Chan as he was created by Earl Biggers, and then later re-created in movies. He tries to move beyond the racial profiling and into the deeper meaning of Chan--what he did and did not do for the image of Asian Americans (even juxatposing his own experience in America as a counterpoint to what might be the easiest critique of Charlie Chan). I found this aspect of the book less entertaining, but very thought provoking, and a unique approach to the issues of race, culture, assimilation, social standing, and the complex melting pot that America is and has been.
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