A first novel by the Chinese dissident and poet whose previous stories (Under the Red Flag, 1997, etc.) have already entitled to him fair comparisons with Solzhenitsyn. Read full book review >
A peek behind the Bamboo Curtain, where Chinese poet Ha Jin, winner of the latest Flannery O'Connor Award, works out the conflicts between tradition and constraint that animate his second collection (after Ocean of Words, 1996). Ha Jin, who writes in English, is a Chinese veteran of the People's Liberation Army and, although he doesn't address political dissidence directly in his work, the 12 stories here all contain that undercurrent of cynicism in the face of authority that's common to military (as well as Communist) societies. Read full book review >
