The author of a book unusually critical of China's premier said Wednesday it will be published this month in Hong Kong despite police threats that he could be put in prison. Yu Jie said the book, titled 'China's Best Actor: Wen Jiabao,' is meant to show the vast difference between the image the premier projects in public -- he has called himself 'Grandpa Wen' -- and his hard-line policies. 'This is a completely deceptive way to speak to people,' Yu said in an interview Wednesday. Yu, 36, is a former best-selling author whose books are now banned in China. He helped found the Independent PEN Center in China which fights for freedom of expression, and is a vocal Christian who has angered authorities with his outspoken defense of religious freedom. Yu said he discussed the book with U.S. Ambassador to China Jon Huntsman during a meeting Tuesday about freedom of expression and other topics, after an invitation from the embassy. 'He was very interested in the book and asked detailed questions,' Yu said. An embassy spokesman confirmed the two met. Yu said the book will be published Aug. 16 in Hong Kong, a former British colony that enjoys freedom of the press as part of its special semiautonomous status. The publisher is Bao Pu, who earlier this year tried to publish a memoir purportedly written by Li Peng, China's premier in 1989 when authorities cracked down on pro-democracy demonstrators at Beijing's Tiananmen Square. Bao dropped the idea because of copyright problems. 'I'm certainly very concerned. I told him I don't want him to get arrested for publishing this book,' Bao said of Yu. 'But he doesn't seem very concerned.' Bao is the son of Bao Tong, a top aide to late Chinese Communist Party General-Secretary Zhao Ziyang, who was purged for opposing military action in Tiananmen and spent the rest of his life under house arrest. Bao Tong wrote the introduction to Yu's book. 'The leaders and the led, everyone is passing their days inside a contradiction,' Bao Tong wrote in the introduction, titled 'The Virtual China and the Real China,' saying Wen is the best example, the best actor. In Wednesday's interview, Yu used Wen's response to the devastating Sichuan earthquake in 2008 as an example. Wen was the first top official at the scene, where he cried, comforted families, and told the parents of crushed children the government would find out why buildings, especially schools, collapsed, Yu said. 'But already two years have passed, and there's nothing,' Yu said. 'Instead, volunteers who investigated the collapsed buildings have been arrested and sentenced.' Police detained Yu last month after word of his book spread online. Yu said he was questioned for more than four hours, mostly about the book's contents. 'The state security people said Wen Jiabao isn't a normal citizen, he's the premier, so criticizing him hurts the nation's interests and security,' Yu said at the time. '(They said) I could be given a heavy sentence like Liu Xiaobo.' Liu, also an author-dissident, is currently serving an 11-year sentence on charges of inciting to subvert state power. Yu said China's policies under Wen and President Hu Jintao are more hard-line in such cases than under previous leader Jiang Zemin. Under international and especially U.S. pressure, several political prisoners were released under Jiang, but no one has been released under Hu and Wen, he said. 'If Wen doesn't agree,' Yu said of his book, 'he can write an article to disagree.' ------ Associated Press Writer Isolda Morillo contributed to this report. 