The Chinese Parrot is the second novel in the Charlie Chan

Charlie Chan

Charlie Chan is a fictional Chinese-American detective created by Earl Derr Biggers in 1919. Loosely based on Honolulu detective Chang Apana, Biggers conceived of the benevolent and heroic Chan as an alternative to Yellow Peril stereotypes, such as villains like Fu Manchu...

 series of mystery novels by Earl Derr Biggers

Earl Derr Biggers

Earl Derr Biggers was an American novelist and playwright. He is remembered primarily for adaptations of his novels, especially those featuring the Chinese-American detective Charlie Chan.-Biography:...

. It is the first in which Chan travels from Hawaii

Hawaii

Hawaii is the newest of the 50 U.S. states , and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean, southwest of the continental United States, southeast of Japan, and northeast of...

 to mainland California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

, and involves a crime whose exposure is hastened by the death of a parrot

Parrot

Parrots, also known as psittacines , are birds of the roughly 372 species in 86 genera that make up the order Psittaciformes, found in most tropical and subtropical regions. The order is subdivided into three families: the Psittacidae , the Cacatuidae and the Strigopidae...

.

The story concerns a valuable string of pearls which is purchased by a wealthy and eccentric financier. The handsome young son of the jeweller is assigned to shepherd the transfer of the pearls to the financier's vacation home in a desert area of California. Because of his long association with the owner of the pearls—before joining the police force, he was her houseboy—Charlie Chan travels from Hawaii to California with the pearls. After two mysterious deaths, first of a Chinese-speaking parrot and then of the household's Chinese man-of-all-work, Charlie Chan masquerades as a pidgin

Chinese Pidgin English

Chinese Pidgin English is a Pidgin language between English and Chinese. From the 17th to the 19th centuries, there was also Chinese Pidgin English spoken in Cantonese-speaking portions of China...

-speaking cook named Ah Kim and works underground to solve a number of crimes. Along the way, the jeweller's son meets a beautiful young woman who works as a location scout and decides to stay in the California desert.

Film, TV or theatrical adaptations

The novel was adapted for film twice, as The Chinese Parrot

The Chinese Parrot (film)

The Chinese Parrot is a silent film, the second in the Charlie Chan series and was directed by Paul Leni. The film is an adaptation of the 1926 Earl Derr Biggers novel of the same name. It is a lost film....

in 1927 and as Charlie Chan's Courage in 1934 (which is considered a lost film

Lost film

A lost film is a feature film or short film that is no longer known to exist in studio archives, private collections or public archives such as the Library of Congress, where at least one copy of all American films are deposited and catalogued for copyright reasons...

).