Tag: Chinese Novel

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Book Reviews Fiction

A Chinese Novel “Forget You, I Cannot” by 寧靜 – 忘記你我做不到

I have picked up this book from either Hong Kong or Taiwan a long time ago. Three unrelated orphans – one boy and two girls – had been adopted by a couple in Hong Kong. Can these orphans fall in love with each other while maintaining family love at the same time? What if their adopted parents understood and supported such a notion? Would their love ultimately destroy the very family that brought them together?

A Chinese novel

The story started off light as the kids grew up together. But it gets darker when the youngest sister – also the rebellious one – fell in love with her brother but her brother and her elder sister have already fallen in love with each other.

Forget You, I Cannot is a story told from the youngest sister’s perspective. This book is a page-turner. There are a good number of plot twists to keep me hooked till the end.

The story is also a tragedy, which is hinted at through the preface. For those who do not read Chinese, here is my attempt to translate the preface for you.

This is my confession.

In my moment when life and death coexist, I write this so that I can see clearly the things that I have done are so stupid and ignorant.

In my memory, he is small as dust. So small that can be stuck in every corner, living in every space.

Because of loving him, I keep on doing my best, but also keep on doing the wrong things. In the end, he is far away from me; he hates me so much.

Therefore, I always think that the most pathetic person in this world is me. In fact, the one who has shaped my current self is no one but me.

My youth can no longer reach the time when it should have blossomed, now withered and destroyed.

Too bad, we can only live once.

I want to see him – my brother – and tell him that I am sorry. But I know an apology is just an apology. It does not wipe away my mistakes.

Darkness has come too early. The waking hours are coming too late.

There is nowhere to turn back. All I can see now is Heaven and Earth.”

Preface from the book 忘記你我做不到 written by 寧靜
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Book Reviews Fiction

鐵凝《永遠有多遠》- “How Long Is Forever” by Tie Ning

A 2009 English publication by Tie Ning

While I have read this book in its original language – Chinese – I have found a English translation selling at Amazon.com.  It is refreshing to read the work of a China writer in Traditional Chinese because given my very limited exposure to Simplified Chinese, my reading appetite is often confined to either authors from Hong Kong or Taiwan.

During this brief period of my renewed interest in reading in my first language, I have realized and begun to internalize the subtle differences in the choice of words and phrases amongst these three different locations – China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan.  In terms of language readability, of course reading works of a Hong Kong writer has always been a breeze to me.  Since I was born there.  Interestingly, I often have this impression that Taiwanese books are easier to read compares to books from China.  But it doesn’t appear so.  Perhaps it is because modern Chinese does not deviate too much from the not-so-modern Chinese that I have spent many years learning in school.

Tie Ning (鐵凝), the author of this book, has come with a long list of credential.  She is the current president of the Chinese Writers Association, the first woman taking on that post.  She has published close to 60 books, some of her works are translated into multiple languages, and some of her works have won awards.

The Chinese version of “How Long Is Forever (2007)” comprises of two novellas 《對面》,《永遠有多遠》 and four novelettes 《孕婦和牛》,《馬路動作》,《玛克力手印》,《暈厥羊》 (Note: ‘novella’ and ‘novelette’ are borrowed terms to describe the relative length of the story and not the actual word count as defined given the fact that these terms are used to measure English literature, not Chinese).  The English version (2009) seems to have the two novellas – “How Long Is Forever” and “Woman Opposite” – and not the rest.

I would describe Tie Ning as a realism writer.  Her characters and stories come alive through the day-to-day routines at the minute detail – intriguing, not mundane.  To borrow one of the critics’ observations from the book’s appendix, in our recent time, it is rare to see someone writing about the good people.  Not perfect, but good.  Like the narrator’s cousin in the novella “How Long Is Forever” who has endured and taken advantage by her ailing grandma, her boyfriends who needed a place to stay, and her own brother.  In the eyes of others, she has always lost out.  But all she does is to always think of others before herself.  Or like the pregnant woman in the novelette “Pregnant Woman And Her Cow”.  The main character is worry free, often take her cow for a walk.  One day she passes by a collapsed pillar that is of heritage value to the village.  The stones are engraved with words but she is illiterate, so is her husband and her husband’s family.  What if her child in the future asks her the meaning of these words?  Quickly she borrowed a pen and a piece of paper from a group of students nearby and started – first time in her life – to write.  And she intends to consult the wise people of the village later.  Such determination!  Tie Ning’s work is almost like a celebration of the not-too-perfect lives of the common people without dwelling into death, depression, desperation, delusion, and evil deeds – themes that could be more popular in today’s world.

In the preface penned by Tie Ning, she wrote that to her, ‘novelettes’ are like scenery.  ‘Novella’, on the other hand, are like stories.  And ‘novels’ are destinies.  I am certainly looking forward to reading the next book of hers.  Perhaps a novel for a change.

PS. Why would Singapore library classifies this book under romance?  I have no clue.

Additional Info and Links: Singapore library tag is TENG, ISBN is 978-962-8958-31-3, publisher’s website is here, and you can buy the English version from Amazon.com by clicking here.

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Book Reviews Fiction

夢枕獏《香魚師》- “Master Ayu Fisherman”, I Know Nuts About Fishing But I Enjoy Reading This

A Japanese novel in Chinese

It is only a matter of time before I revisit my childhood passion of reading Japanese novels translated in Chinese.  I read Japanese novels translated in English, such as Haruki Murakami.  Maybe there is a certain proximity between the two languages – Japanese and Chinese, I suspect that the Chinese translation is probably closer to the original flavor than English.  I do not read Japanese.  And hence, purely my speculation.

I know nuts about fishing.  I did fish once, or twice when I was young.  That was all the experience I have.  《香魚師》, which I would translate the title to “Master Ayu Fisherman” for reference here, is a fictional work that is all about fishing.  Not any kind of fishing, but a specific fish specimen – Ayu (you could read more about Ayu in Wikipedia here).  The preface has done a great job in giving an introduction on Ayu, the different kinds of fishing tackles – the fish hook that is called “hair rig” – and the environmental impact that affects the habitats of Ayu.

Each chapter of “Master Ayu Fishman” begins with a special title given for a particular “hair rig”.  The writing style consists of lots of paragraphs of short sentences and the translator or editor (茂吕美耶) has done a fantastic job in footnoting the novel at places that may cause confusion if you are  not a Japanese.  As I read the book, I suspected that it was originally published in newspapers or magazines and I was right (magazines indeed).  That are repeated references to previous chapters that initially I found it odd.  But it is not so odd if the original readers have to wait before reading the next installment.

“Master Ayu Fisherman” is about men’s obsession in fishing.  Ayu is often called “Sweetfish” for its special scent of melon and cucumber and “Year-Fish” for its one year lifespan.  Ayu’s life journey starts near the seashore and ends as they return from the sea to the seashore area and lay eggs.  There are seasonal bans in Japanese on Ayu fishing.  In the periods when the bans are lifted, enthusiasts would put aside their daily activities and fish.  There are various ways to fish Ayu, and many types of “hair rig” developed to tackle different situations.  I am not a fishing enthusiast, but I am intrigued by the passion people have on fishing.  In the story, there is this one particular rare hair rig called 黑水仙 (“Black Narcissus”), the only hair rig that can lure the abnormally huge Ayu that survives more than one year.  It is a story of two men’s obsession to go after that huge Ayu, almost like an addict.  In a strange way, I can relate (close friends of mine would know why).

According to the author, in Amazon, women incorporated their pubic hairs into the hair rig in order to fish a particular type of fish, long time ago.  That rare hair rig in the chapter, “Black Narcissus”, is created by just that.  Now, I have tried Google this bizarre concept.  There seems to be some applications of such setup but I am unable to verify the linkage to fishing in Amazon.  Nevertheless, I think Japanese does have some strange concepts and using pubic hair to create a fishing tackle may well be one of many.

Overall I enjoy reading 《香魚師》.  The Japanese author 夢枕獏 appears to be popular in Taiwan.  And he has spent four to five years in writing this book, being an avid fisherman himself during the period when this book was written.

Additional Info: Singapore library tag is YUMB, YLib official site, author official site and ISBN 978-957-32-6191-9.

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Book Reviews Fiction

王璞《補充記憶》- “Memory Refill” – And My Reading Habit

Another Chinese book I've read

How do you choose what to read from a library or a bookstore full of books?  When it comes to English titles, these days, I have a set of authors that I keep going back to.  As for Chinese titles, it is still this whole new experience of discovery and exploration.  Quite a few I have borrowed were returned to the bookshelf the next day.  One friend once asked, “Do you finished all the books you pick?”  For English books, it is a yes.  Because I often know what I am going into.  Book reviews are everywhere in the Internet.  There is even a great book I have – The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages – to help me decide what to read next.

In 1995, Cosmos Books in Hong Kong held a writing competition, on literature.  Not romance, thriller, short stories, or popular fiction.  But on literature.  First of its kind during that era, the book publisher had put aside a budget of US$60,000 to make it happen. 《補充記憶》(a translated title by me would be “Memory Refill”) by an author I have read recently came out as 2nd runner up.  There was no worthy winner so there were two 1st runner up winners instead.  What a strange way to round up the competition.  Nonetheless, the motivation of the competition was to rekindle the passion of  literature writing in mid-90’s Hong Kong.  That gets me thinking.  If the majority of the locals say in Singapore read materials created by the West – an inevitable reality of cultural influence (or shall I say domination?) – who will be there to support the local writing industry that would create works that represent a fragment of our society?

Back to Chinese book selection and this book “Memory Refill”, I pick this book to read because it is a award winning material – however small scale the competition might be – and it is a literature, not a popular fiction.  I would still say the author’s latter work 《嘉年華會》- “Carnival (2008)” – has a higher literature value.  Having said that, those who enjoy reading the short story 《啤酒》(“Beer”) would enjoy reading 《補充記憶》(“Memory Refill”).

The main character of the novel is a forty years old doctor Jung-ji 容易 (literally means “Easy”, a comical derivation – I suppose – by her promiscuity, or I would read it as 容兒 – a phonetically sounded female name) and her twenty-odd years old patient NO who has suffered memory lost after a car accident.  Is it a blessing in disguise that one losses his or her memory?  Jung-ji ponders.  As the doctor helps the patient to regain his memory, through unconventional means that are no lacking in humor, the doctor herself recollects her painful memory that she would want to lose.  Her failed relationships (or failing as a matter of fact) and men who simply would not stay.  The story development is not linear and it is a pleasure to read, for me that is.

“Memory Refill” is not a love story.  It is a journey of a woman seeking closure to the relationships of the past.

Additional Info: Singapore library tag is WGPU and ISBN 962-950-209-7.

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Book Reviews Coincidence Fiction

張子璘《早苗》- “Zoumiu”, Again, 9 Short Stories

Zoumiu

This has to be a coincidence.  I randomly picked four Chinese novels to read from the library.  The previous book is a collection of nine short stories.  This books is also a collection of nine short stories.  Relationship, especially in the form of divorce, is one of the themes of the previous book.  Same for this book.  The previous book writes in a certain style of surrealism blurring reality with illusion.  This book, same.  And when one of the stories from 《早苗》“Zoumiu” – note that I translate based on the pronunciation because the title is derived from a female name – has a scene of the main character pondering with a glass of cold beer, I flipped.  It was as though I was reading 《嘉年華會》(“Carnival”).  The beer, the divorce, the surrealism, the same number of stories – either it is a common trend in today’s Chinese literature bear in mind that “Zoumiu” is written by a Taiwanese writer while “Carnival” by a Hong Kong writer, the coincidence is simply, surreal.

Before I comment on the “Zoumiu”, I would like to write a bit on what I observe on the languages of these two geographic locations (can’t really say countries, can I?).  Hong Kong and Taiwan are most likely the only two places in this entire world that the people still write in Traditional Chinese.  I sincerely wish with all my heart that Traditional Chinese will not vanish, swallowed by the Simplified Chinese so commonly promoted by China.  For those who wonder what the difference between the two is, it is as though “Simplified English” becomes official and words such as ‘wot’, ‘happend’, ‘wif’, ‘btw’, ‘u’, ‘tt’, ‘impresn’ become the endorsed language.  Imagine English classics printed with those simplified forms.  The analogy may be crude and not entirely correct.  But the essence is there.  And that is how I feel when I read Simplified Chinese.

While I was reading “Zoumiu”, I realize that the choice of words between these two places – Hong Kong and Taiwan – can be different.  An analogy could be the subtle difference when you read British novels and American novels.  Both are written in English.  But there are differences between the two.  I, for one, read Hong Kong novels at a much faster pace.

At times, I am not sure which culture is more dramatic in nature – Taiwan or Hong Kong?  “Zoumiu” is prefaced by two I supposed reputable writer and editor in Taiwan.  Full of over-the-top promises that set my expectation sky high on “Zoumiu”, before I have even started reading the book.  The author 張子璘 has won the 1st prize of the Taiwan’s “Save the Literature” award.  “Zoumiu” is a story of love, and death.  Death is the center theme.  The nine stories are: 《早苗》《那個中午》《夜裡》《活者的記憶》《背影》《陌生人》《等待》《嫉妒的漂浮》《緩慢的自由》.  Again, for ease of reference, I would translate the titles to “Zoumiu”, “That Afternoon”, “In the Night”, “Memory of the Living”, “View of the Back”, “Stranger”, “To Wait”, “Jealousy Afloat”, “The Slowness of Freedom”.

“Memory of the Living” has perhaps the most impact on me.  In the story, the main character’s mother often stares outside the window, every passing moment of the day, holding a little black box.  One day, the main character returns home and discovers his mother has committed suicide.  He then opens the box and understands what his mother meant by: “I will tell it to you one day, until you mother is too tired, cannot hold it any longer, and I will pass it to you”.  My heart sunk when I too discovered what it is.

Another favorite story of mine is “Stranger”.  One day, a girl discovers a corpse like stranger appears in her home.  And through interacting with this stranger, conversing on the topic of her first divorce and second marriage, the stranger does not seem that foreign any more.  An extract of the story below (the author puts an extract upfront at the beginning of each story, interestingly).

要不是岀現了陌生男子，今天也不過是如此平常的一天，回頭看看剛才走過的路，著實讓她安心不少。那個險白得像個死屍的男人，現在想起来也不覺得害怕了。

The rest of the stories, like these two, explore on the decisions people make, on love, at times observed from a distance, almost like reading from a spirit’s view, or indeed from a spirit’s view.  Some stories are inconclusive leaving me to ponder on what is real and what is not.  One story, “Jealousy Afloat”, the main character is obsessed with the memory and illusion of his lost love decades ago, keeps revisiting old places until he sees her, together with the younger him.  The writing style of that story could seem extreme, but I tend to think that the author is gifted in bringing human interactions alive.

Additional Info: Singapore library tag is ZGZL, Wisdom Books official site, and ISBN 978-957-450-508-1.

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Book Reviews Fiction

王璞《嘉年華會》- “Carnival”, 9 Short Stories‏

Carnival

Almost in a similar period when I appear to have given up eating meat all of a sudden, I have this sudden urge to rediscover my Chinese root.  Reality is, nothing is ‘all of a sudden’.  I have been wanting to give up eating meat for ages.  And I have been wanting to brush up on my Chinese for ages.  Reading Chinese novels is merely a first step of my long term ambition to regain my innate linguistic ability to its fullest and beyond.  I want to be able to read, understand, and pronounce 100% of the words found in a modern novel, able to write in Chinese, and able to create literature in Chinese.  After all, I believe all my friends who remain in Hong Kong are able to do all these.  I am merely playing catchup.

The joy of reading Chinese books is indescribable.  Language-wise, I am able to understand almost all the words and expressions (versus English novels).  But mere understanding is not my primary aim.  I want to be able to pronounce them as well (unlike the Western language, you can’t really pronounce a Chinese word if you don’t know the word).  And that is when modern technology helps a great deal.  I have found a site that helps me to find out how to pronounce a certain Chinese word in Cantonese.  With my mobile phone that allows me to enter traditional Chinese in handwriting mode, I can look for a word wherever and whenever I need to.

Beyond words, I believe some of you who read both English and Chinese literature would agree with me that the ‘feel’ of the two is very different.  It is the vividness of drama and sound, the emotional complexity, the culture and values, and much more that makes reading Chinese such a joyful experience.  One could take a piece of Chinese literature, translate into English, and to me, the essence is simply lost.  How could one translate the literal meaning of “scrap my eyes and see”, “rub in oil and add vinegar”, or “white as the cleanliness of jade and the clarity of ice”?  Sounds so strange when translated literally but sounds so good when read in the original language.

Back to 《嘉年華會》- one of the four Chinese books I have borrowed from the library recently, the author 王璞 is born in Hong Kong, has lived in China, and since 1989, stationed in Hong Kong.  I have deliberately chosen a Hong Kong writer because I reckon I can relate better – both in terms of the writing style as well as the locations and culture. 《嘉年華會》is a collection of short stories – 《希臘拖鞋》《嘉年華會》《收藏家》《跳房子》《悼念綠旗袍》《河邊少婦》《我的高麗同學》《啤酒》《流氓是怎樣煉成的》.  For the ease of reference, I would translate these titles to: “Greek Sandals”, “Carnival”, “Collector”, “Hopscotch”, “Mourning of the Green Chinese Dress”, “Young Woman by the River”, “My Korean Schoolmates”, “Beer”, and “Thugs are Made of This”.

Some stories such as “Carnival” and “Thugs are Made of This” are rather short, like a few pages.  “Beer” is perhaps the lengthiest of all for it takes up half a book.  If there is a common theme amongst these stories, that would be an attempt to mix the reality with illusion.  Another theme would be the loss of something.  The author would try to convince the reader something exists only to later on blur it into illusion.  Or a relationship that is well and good and then out of nowhere, a huge quarrel breaks out (that reads like watching a typical local TV drama) and the couple parts way.

In most of the stories, divorce seems to be a main topic.  I wonder why.  Relationships do not seem to work out.  In fact, nothing works out in all the short stories.  The story “Beer” is perhaps one of my favorite.  It has the depth and complexity that I enjoy reading.  The story’s main character is someone who has experienced four divorces and a childhood crush on a train that still lives vividly in her.  To chain the plots is her passion to drinking beer.  To add onto the plot is the main character’s mission to locate her missing father.  All these plots are told not in a sequential manner, but rather randomly picked as the narrator recollects her life story.  The most amazing thing is how the main character – a writer – creates and distorts the story of her childhood crush, in the form of short essays.  That creates a story within a story – an exploration of what happens when love in reality meets with love as an illusion.

I am glad that the book ends with “Thugs are Made of This”.  In just 16 pages, the author tells a story of an apartment owner from being Mr. Nice to someone rude and nasty after a series of unfortunate events.  Such quickness in plot development, what a way to end the book.  I will certainly look for more books written by 王璞.  And one quote from the book to end this entry.

即使是像我一個逆来順受的女人，也有一顆跳動的心。

Additional Info: Singapore library tag is WGPU, Cosmos Books official site, and ISBN 978-988-211-977-2

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Book Reviews Fiction Whacky Thoughts

An Attempt To Pinpoint Why I Still Love Reading Chinese Literature – A Brief Review of 倪匡中篇奇情武俠系列《金腰帶》

倪匡中篇奇情武俠系列《金腰帶》

I have read tens or perhaps hundreds of English books but none matches the sensation I derive from reading in my mother tongue.  Like this particular book I am going to feature here, I was so deeply affected that my mind just wouldn’t allow me to do anything else right after I’ve finished reading the book.  The plot was alive in my mind for days thereafter.  I still cannot pinpoint why.  All I could guess is that the reading pleasure may come in fourfold: the native understanding of the passages, the linkage to the culture and tradition, the construct of the phrases, and the depth and complexity of the development of human characters within.

People at times tease me on how much I suck in English spelling, which is true.  Unlike English whereby words are constructed in alphabets that can be pronounced without knowing the underlying meanings, you can’t do the same for Chinese characters.  You may be able to recognize the meaning of a character because characters are often assembled in components that represent the picture, sound, color, or the combined meaning.  It is only fair to say that I am trained in recognizing and replicating words in the form of characters rather than memorizing the pronunciation of the words in alphabets.  While I can quite easily find a Chinese book that I can recognize 99.99% of the words within, I can hardly say the same for English, by a far margin.

Recognition of words aside, it is often the context of a certain phrase derived from some literatures written in the old days that contributes to the art value of the modern day Chinese literature.  If I was to soak myself into the work of Homer or Shakespeare or Dante or Woolf the same number of years I soaked myself in the Chinese poems and classic literature and history, I think I may be able to gain a similar level of appreciation from reading English literature.  I knew that all those years of reciting old Chinese poems and literature does translate into something.  There is just no easy way to do this except to invest time and effort.  It is part of the culture and tradition that is imbued in me from young.

Another notable difference, especially in the genre of Wuxia (that I will explain later), is the excessive usage of dramatic and explicit expressions to describe situations that often lift up my soul just by reading those phrases at face value.  For those who have the Chinese background, let’s see how many of the following phrases you can recognize.  To describe a fearful looking man, we use “the horizontal growth of facial flesh” to paint a brutal picture of his face.  To describe the break of dawn, we compare that scenic view to “the white belly of a fish”.  Picture yourself in front of a half naked blacksmith creating a piece of metal weapon.  As the hammer hits the red hot piece of steel, you can see the pulsation of this man’s muscles.  We describe his muscles as “an infinite number of jumping mice”.  When faced with a clamoring crowd, we describe the situation as “seven mouths and eight tongues”.  Why is there an extra tongue?  That is how noisy the crowd is.  Finally, I will leave the last example, a four-character Chinese word, for you to decipher – “the howling of the devil, the rallying of the god”.

There is a certain parallelism between the Chinese genre Wuxia and the Western fantasy I believe.  As I was once told, in the world of the Western fantasy, the good and evil is often well defined.  It is the same for Wuxia though to add to the element of drama, there is often shades of good and evil.  There are evil characters that may behave in an honorable way or good characters turn bad.  The center philosophy of Wuxia is a blend of honor and martial arts.  In the godless world of Wuxia, characters wield rare weapons, have gifted talents, able to perform martial arts, and some gain once-in-a-lifetime enlightenment to take them from heroes to legends.  Center to the human character in the world of Wuxia is honor, love, hatred, deceit, revenge, betrayal, struggle, and sacrifice.  It is hard to define any Wuxia piece of work as comedy or tragedy like a Western piece of work.  Chinese authors seem to have no qualm in letting their most beloved characters assassinated, murdered, killed, mutilated, disfigured, or even raped at times by the very person these characters trust, by the most evil characters, or simply by the most insignificant characters.  If there is any redemption to all these mishaps, the plot of a typical Wuxia story often resolves to the theme of: justice will prevail, honor will be restored.  But at what cost?  That is the beauty of this genre.  The authors’ imagination is the limit.

Ni Kuang (倪匡) is a Chinese writer from Hong Kong who is famous for his science fictions.  I cannot recall how many of his books I have read when I was a student.  His venture into the Wuxia genre is new to me.  In fact, this genre has been dominated by the legendary works of Jin Yong (金庸) that are usually lengthy and come in a volume of one, two, four, or five (another interesting observation is that some Western literature often comes in the form of trilogy instead).  Ni Kuang has written a set of short Wuxia stories (each story roughly equals to 1/32 of a typical length of a story by Jin Yong) when he was young but the timing was not right for him to release his materials.  It could be because short Wuxia stories were against the norm back then.  Now that Ni Kuang is in his 70s and all of a sudden, he has decided to release all his Wuxia works in one go.  Rejoice for fans like me of course.  With such drastic reduction in length, Ni Kuang has stripped away the historical references to the main storyline like the typical Wuxia novelists do, the poems and the scenic descriptions that are so prominently demonstrated in Jin Yong’s work, as well as having a much limited character set.  The result is a tight storyline, fast pace read with a high entertainment value.

《金腰帶》 (loosely translates to “The Golden Belt”) as part of Ni Kuang’s medium length Wuxia story series contains two short stories, like the rest in the same series.  The first story is about how a daughter of an evil lord gets involved with a young hero who is in love with a lady from a good lord.  The second independent story is about how a daughter seeks revenge after her parents were murdered due to a treasure they stole and later on falls in love with the son of the very person she is seeking revenge upon.  I have retold the story to Cynthia in English (with drawings, timeline, and flowcharts) and she was deeply moved.  I guess, in a rather long fashion, I have illustrated the last attribute of the uniqueness of Chinese or especially Wuxia stories: the depth and complexity of the development of human character within.

Categories
Book Reviews Fiction

Requiem of Ling Sing (A Deadly Secret) by Jin Jong

I have read novels from Jin Jong since young. His great work has helped to shape my character and every time when I reread his works in various time of my life, different emotions resonance from within me. His work is complex and I have yet to find any novel in any language that can be as engaging as his work. Sad to say, he has only written 12 stories (36 books in total) and has decided to retire from writing Wuxia (translate: martial arts heroes) novels on the year when I was born (1972). Click here for Yin Yong’s fan site.
I don’t recall I have read this particular story by Jin Jong. I must have given it a pass because it is just a story with one book (usually each story comes with four volumes). Today is Good Friday and I have finished the book in one day. Throughout my reading, I was trying to pinpoint the success ingredients of Jin Jong’s work. Perhaps it is due to the fact that his work was used to be published in the newspaper daily and with limited space, you really have to make each daily dosage as engaging as possible by delivering one small plot as well as enticing the readers with another.

As I reached the end of the book, I realized that the success ingredients are more than that. The highest level of art form is when the characters inside the book have come alive. Be it as you love them to death or hate them to death, you laugh and wipe with them.