Award-winning journalist - and author of Hello, Shadowlands - Patrick Winn reveals the inside story of a forbidden republic - the narco-state of the Wa The jagged mountains dividing China and Burma belong to the Wa, an indigenous group who have outwitted the CIA to create the world's mightiest narco-state, controlling more territory than Israel and with more troops than Sweden. Are they crime lords? Or visionaries? Wa State has become a real nation with its own highways, anthems, schools and flags. Its leaders promise a utopia, using profits from trafficking heroin and meth to attain what China's other frontier peoples, Tibetans and Uighurs, can only dream of: a state of their own. Patrick Winn (author of Hello, Shadowlands) embarks on a risky journey of discovery, chasing clues about the forbidden republic from Thailand to Burma to the secretive Wa State itself.

Largely isolated from the world for more than four decades, Myanmar has made a remarkable return to the global stage following a political transformation that represents a watershed moment in the country's history. Now, for the first time ever, the rich culture, stunning landscapes and diverse peoples of the country are presented in a unique visual time capsule. Here is the new Myanmar as seen over a single week by a team of thirty famous photographers from eleven different countries. Their mission? To capture the life and spirit of Myanmar from every angle in every corner of the country.

'Reads like a thriller you can't put down' - Megha Rajagopalan, China Bureau Chief, Buzzfeed News

'ensures you’ll never think about Southeast Asia in the same way ever again.' - Geographical Magazine

Essential to understanding Southeast Asia in the 21st century, Hello, Shadowlands reveals a booming underworld of organised crime across a region in flux― a $100 billion trade that deals in narcotics, animals and people ―and the staggering human toll that is being steadily ignored by the West.

From Myanmar’s anarchic hills to the swamplands of Vietnam, jihadis are being pitted against brothel workers, pet thieves against vigilantes and meth barons against Christian vice squads.

Hello, Shadowlands takes a deep plunge into crime rings both large and small. It also examines how China’s rise and America’s decline is creating new opportunities for transnational syndicates to thrive.

Focusing on human stories on both sides of this crime wave, the acclaimed Bangkok-based broadcaster and journalist Patrick Winn intimately profiles the men and women of the region who are forced to make agonizing choices in the absence of law.