Search results for ""ACA Publishing Limited""

In a cave high in the ageless mountains of China’s desolate interior, an ancient funeral singer awaits the end. From his deathbed he gives voice to the generations of villagers to whom he devoted his life’s work, and four all-too-human souls whose struggles defined an era.A soldier, a peasant, a revolutionary and a politician. When revolt and reform take hold of the wartorn plains, all play their debased roles in the mythic cycle of avarice, vengeance and suffering.As his four tragedies interweave, the cracked lips of the dying sage conjure a stark vision: a retelling of the forging of the People’s Republic – from turbulent birth to absurd reversal – whispered from its uncharted margins.

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By turns flexible and delicate, taciturn and effusive, this collection of memoirs and micro-essays project in filmic clarity the cool head, dry wit and social conscience that have made Su Tong the ‘master of implication’ among China’s leading writers. Ranging from street-level portraits of a boisterous and rapidly changing nation to quiet musings on humanity’s strange and secret compulsions, Su Tong offers a glimpse behind the curtain into the workings of a keen mind that helped shape the literary and popular culture of modern China.

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1960s Zhongguancun, Beijing. A gang of young scientists toils into the night over the nation’s first atomic bomb. They have no way of knowing that their work will go on to lay the foundation of China’s enterprising tech sector, producing the likes of Lenovo, Baidu, ByteDance, and more.With unprecedented access to the key figures behind the rise of Chinese tech giants, literary master, Ning Ken, delves into more than five decades of history and reveals the hidden triumphs and disasters that forged the "Silicon Valley of the East."As China sits on the cusp of global leadership, these are the companies that will champion the material reality of the Asian Century. Based on years of extensive research, the author unveils the humanity that lies behind these products, the innovative leaders and managers that shaped them, and the divergent tomorrow that they are building.

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Shortly after Japan's surrender in August 1945, a huge bonfire was built at the headquarters of Kwantung Kempeitai in Changchun, Northeast China. Hundreds of boxes of files were lost to the flames over the following days, but the unexpected arrival of Soviet soldiers prompted the Japanese to hastily bury some of them. These were unearthed by construction workers in 1953 and eventually handed over to archivists in the early 1980s.This is the third volume in a series based on the studies of these documents. It comprises 293 pages of inspection reports on correspondence sent by Japanese troops and others between January and July 1940. The Kempeitai ruled that many of the letters be censored or confiscated due to the sensitive nature of their content. Extracts from these letters are contained within the inspection reports, and give us an insight into what was happening on the ground in occupied China during that period.

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Of all the brief lives I’ve inhabited, humans are definitely the most interesting. Poetry and painting, literature and drama, song and dance; there’s nothing they can’t do.As I fell into this young creature named Ding Yi, a life filled with hardship, love and betrayal unfolded before me.I’ll try to make this account as entertaining as possible, but please bear with me – it was several lifetimes ago.My Travels in Ding Yi is an epic novel told from the perspective of a nomadic spirit named Shi who inhabits a Chinese boy living in the second half of the 20th century. Shi describes coming of age during the Cultural Revolution in language that dips and soars from crude to lyrical, often in a single breath. Unpredictable and engrossing, this contemporary classic of Chinese fiction was first published in 2006 and is now available in English for the first time.

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China is undergoing profound demographic, societal and cultural changes, and these changes are having a considerable impact on the provision of public services and on the complex relationship between the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the government. This book introduces the framework of the Chinese government, explains the constitution and the operation of the National People’s Congress (NPC), the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), the central people’s government and local governments.Emphasis is placed on analyzing the reforms in China’s public service sector, the important changes that are taking place and the impact of current government policies on free education, employment, medical care, social welfare and relief work.The authors focus on introducing the basic framework and operation process of the Chinese government, the reform and development of public service in China, and recent reform initiatives. They explain how the government management system operates based on its people-oriented principles, how it is reforming and adopting innovative measures to provide public service, how it is gradually delivering the basic rights of Chinese citizens, and how it aims to achieve the ultimate goal of social justice.This book also underscores the inner logic of China’s public service system reform, in which the government used to take care of everything, but now is striving to manage the different needs of diversified participants.

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Since ancient times, Jiwo village and its forests have been a sanctuary. Man, beast and those somewhere in between live in harmony, all part of a timeless chorus, until one day a discordant note strikes with the emergence of the tyrant Tang Laotuo and his son Tang Tong, stripping the land bare to feed their expanding industrial empire.Among the natives in the spreading dusty haze is the beautiful hedgehog spirit Mei Di, and her headstrong husband Liao Mai. Their home is a rural utopia threatened by the foul noise and smoke belching from the Tang’s factories.As the bulldozers rumble ever closer, the change not only strains the lovers’ relationship but also puts Jiwo’s age-old balance in jeopardy. A reckoning will surely come one day, and as silence falls, will anyone still remember the old songs?

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The fate of the Ming hangs on a knife edge. In the south, defence against relentless pirate raids is escalating into all-out war. The beleaguered Chinese forces must rally for a desperate last stand fought across salt and sand. Nearby, fearless magistrate Hai Rui is tasked with investigating a major corruption scandal. In Beijing, a chance to trump the embezzling viper Yan Song and his influential clan presents itself. There to snatch it is the Crown Prince, and his coalition of the righteous. At a time when the appearance of a mysterious 'blood scripture' could either turn the tide or unleash chaos untold, chief eunuch Lu Fang, a loyal and yet crafty kingmaker, is forced to choose sides. In war as in the Forbidden City, the game is sudden death. Now, China's heroes make their move: a perilous gambit to salvage centuries of progress. If they fail everything burns.

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Many Western economists have predicted the coming collapse of China, but the world’s second-largest economy continues to demonstrate its resilience and confound the pessimists. It will soon overtake the US in terms of overall GDP, having already become the world’s top trading and investor nation. But its importance is not limited to the world of business and finance; China has become a more significant and more confident country in terms of global politics, technology, the environment and culture.

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13 December 1937. The Japanese army storms Nanjing, the capital of China at the time. What follows is one of the most violent and controversial periods in history, its consequences still affecting Sino-Japanese relations to this day. Some even deny that it ever happened. Appalled by such reactions and fearing that the horrors of the massacre may be forgotten, author He Jianming sets out to chronicle the truth behind the many war crimes. These include the massacre of every captured Chinese man under the guise of ‘mopping up’ defeated soldiers, the widespread plague of rape and murder that terrorised the female population of the city, and the looting of cultural relics and a national fortune. He compiles records from Chinese, Japanese and international sources, from those who witnessed, survived and committed the atrocities, In the hope that the Nanjing Massacre will never be forgotten.

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Following heroic victories on the battlefield, a former soldier faces his greatest challenge from the enemy within. Yu Erlong, a veteran guerrilla captain of the Chinese Communist Party, returns to a remote place to confront his past. Stone lake was where he grew up in poverty on a fishing boat and then fought against the Kuomintang and the Japanese for control of his motherland. It was also the scene of the shooting of his beloved wife, Luhua. Thirty years after that cowardly murder, Erlong, with flowers in hand, is determined to find Luhua's remains and solve the mystery of who pulled the trigger. The second volume of Li Guowen's award-winning Spring in Winter explores a web of personal relationships against the backdrop of four decades of tumultuous political change in China, from the civil war in the 1930s to the end of the Cultural Revolution in the 1970s.

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How many decades does a man have to run to extricate himself from the consequences of a troubled past? A guerrilla act many years ago still has repercussions for Yu Erlong and his family, colleagues and rivals. From the death of a comrade 30 years ago, to family life and political rivalries, Yu Erlong strives to be fair and just, even when others have less honourable intentions, motivated by personalities and acts separated by many decades. The struggle of a grandfather and grandson to capture a prized red carp mirrors the battle of wits needed when encountering adversaries who reappear after many years. The memories of Luhua, the love he lost, the new life he makes for himself around Stone lake, his friends and his foes, are all beautifully choreographed in Spring in Winter. Spring in Winter, originally published in Chinese in 1981 when it won the prestigious 'Mao Dun Literature Prize', was one of the first novels in China to use the 'stream of consciousness technique' more often seen in Western literature. Author Li Guowen interweaves his enchanting tale against the dramatic backdrop of decades of struggle and fighting that prevailed in China from 1937 until after the end of the Cultural Revolution in 1976.

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Will the newest branch of a decaying house be bent or broken by these uncertain times? It has been six years since China threw off imperial rule, yet Beijing seems largely unchanged. The city is a chaotic, roiling sea of humanity inhabited by merchants, hawkers and street urchins. In the midst of it all, Qi Yuexuan, the sole scion of a distinguished family, lives a life of indolence. But change is coming. Forces from within and without are becoming increasingly influential, while the new ideas they bring are shaking the foundations of the nation. Reappraising his entrenched values, Qi is torn between tradition and the new order. The Elm Tree paints an intimate, yet vivid picture of an extraordinary cast of characters associated with the Qi household. It documents a forgotten way of life before it was swept away by the turmoil of foreign occupation and civil war...

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The Zhou Enlai Interviews: 1937-1971 draws on thousands of recorded transcripts from meetings between Zhou and various Chinese and foreign reporters.This book is a collection of Zhou Enlai’s thoughts on the most complex and pressing issues of the day, including interviews never published before.

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My Uncle Zhou Enlai paints a candid and heartwarming picture of one of China’s most beloved leaders and its first premier, Zhou Enlai (1898-1976). Written by his nephew, Zhou Erliu, who found himself at the heart of the political turmoil of the 20th century, this deeply moving and personal account is at once a touching family portrait of the Zhou clan and a comprehensive overview of China’s modern political history.Through personal anecdotes, letters, poems, photographs and other relics from the premier’s epoch-making life, the reader gets up close and personal with Zhou Enlai as never before and gets an intimate peek at life in China during these turbulent times.This book interweaves the fascinating life story of its author, from his childhood in Shanghai’s French concession through his involvement with the Communist Party of China (CPC) in the years of war and revolution up to the present day, and the story of his ‘Qi Ba’, the prominent CPC leader who was at the forefront of major events such as the founding of the PRC, the Cultural Revolution, the Nanchang Uprising, the Chinese Civil War and US president Richard Nixon’s visit to China in 1971, yet always found time to advise his beloved nephew about work, life, love and politics.My Uncle Zhou Enlai aims to set straight the historical facts and to convey the great impact Zhou Enlai had on Chinese and international politics, which paved the way for China’s re-entry into the international community. Always honest, wise, humble and kind, Zhou Enlai is warmly remembered by millions of people today both within and outside China, and this book serves as a testament by a close relative to the many Chinese and foreign lives he touched. A must-read for anyone interested in China’s history and cultural landscape, its gradual opening-up to the rest of the world, and its notable leaders and key figures.

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Wan Li, a Shandong native, operated at the highest level of party and government during his long and illustrious career. Arguably his finest hour was the ground-breaking agricultural reforms he pushed through in the impoverished rural areas of Anhui province. The reforms proved so successful that they were later extended countrywide and legally enshrined in the constitution. As minister of railways in 1975, his claim to fame was getting rid of factionalism among railway workers and leaders, getting the trains to run on time, and reviving railway construction to enable it to facilitate national economic growth.Wan Li: Resolute Reformer and Legislator is illustrated with numerous rare photographs charting the life story of this key figure in 20th-century Chinese politics. Readers will be able to trace the footsteps of this steadfast reformist from a childhood of poverty in Shandong Province to the highest levels of authority within the Chinese Communist Party.

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In the early years of the PRC, Fujian was something of a poisoned chalice. Its proximity to Taiwan brought with it a concentration of top cadres who were at first lined up to lead the planned retaking of Taiwan, but later left behind to become a thorn in the side of future governors.Xiang Nan, a native Fujianese, was one such ‘unlucky’ leader who ran into direct conflict with the cadres. However, thanks to Xiang, the reformers won the day over the hardliners, cementing Fujian as a key player in China’s 1980s ‘Reform and Opening Up’.Xiang Nan: Champion of Reform in Fujian tells the story of this fearless reformer through pictures and anecdotes from those who knew him best. Featuring many previously unpublished photographs and anecdotes from his travels within China and overseas, readers will gain a fascinating insight into this important figure in recent Chinese history.

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As a student revolutionary, Xi Zhongxun saw that China’s communists had only one source of strength: not money, not modern arms, not foreign aid, but the support of China’s ‘plain folk’. For him, the maxim ‘Serve the People’ was an imperative. After coming to power, some officials forgot service, and instead began to act as masters. However, Xi Zhongxun was never one of those who forgot.Xi spent years in wrongful imprisonment for this devotion to principle. But at no time did he waver from his faith in a bright future for China, which he was certain would be led by an enlightened Communist Party. Even before he was exonerated, he continued his fight against wrong.Xi Zhongxun: Father of a Great Nation’s Leader tells the story of this incredible man, who went on to become the father of Xi Jinping, the current leader of the People’s Republic of China.

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A lame joke can be a crushing experience The people of Yanjin know to always have a few jokes on hand. For three thousand years, they have been terrorised by Hua Erniang, a forsaken spirit that rules over their dreams. Failing to amuse this supernatural guest means not waking up at all, crushed by her jilted heart which has calcified into a mountain. Growing up inside a town adapting to socialist ideals, Mingliang's life is beset with hardship and adversity that leaves his family in tatters. Seeking fortune elsewhere, he heads west across China's vast central plain, encountering nothing but restless souls mortgaged to debts from former lives, each unwilling to move on for their own reasons. No matter how many times you try to start afresh, you can only run so far from a broken home. Some wounds take more than a lifetime to heal, but in the meantime, a few wisecracks tucked into the back pocket won't hurt.

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One Day Three Autumns was written to preserve the memory of the author's sixth uncle, a talented artist whose paintings were tragically burned after his death. It attempts to bring them back to life in writing, proving that those we love are never truly gone, and that a home is more than what we choose to fill it with.

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A collection of four short stories on the brutal realities of family life in modern China. When a household crumbles, it's always the women who are left picking up the pieces, but no one comes out looking good when caught in a vicious cycle of abuse. Come inside at your peril: after all, what's a closet without its skeletons?

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When rumours spread of corruption, Mayor Li Gaocheng is determined to find the truth. However, a lifetime of steadfast service leaves him ill-equipped for this new China where there is nothing that money can't buy. As the web of deceit unravels, he must choose whether to investigate just how deep it goes even if what he finds hits close to home.

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Han Meilin is a titan of contemporary Chinese art, from Olympic mascots to the tails of planes, his works have drawn worldwide recognition. But behind the fame, he was forged in the crucible of China’s Cultural Revolution.In an uncertain political landscape where suspicion itself was as good as proof, the very thing that gave him purpose - his passion for art - doomed him to an indefinite Purgatory behind bars in No. 100 Dongshan detention centre. Branded a traitor to the revolution, he faced a decade of despair, but at its cruel depths, he discovered the values which would shape him as an artist. Now in conversation with the premier storyteller on China’s turbulent 1960s, Meilin recounts his turbulent path to Paradise. Filled with first-hand accounts of his complex relationship with the suffering he endured, and the many ways it continues to reverberate in the hyper-commercial today of the Middle Kingdom.

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The Sisterhood meets every morning in Hai Ruo's teashop to discuss life, love, careers and everything that gets in the way of happiness. Hai Ruo strives to keep the sisterhood together and seeks spiritual intervention to provide answers, but the cracks grow wider as pressure closes in.

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1926. Wuhan is in lockdown.Fourteen years ago, its heroes toppled China’s last emperor, but at great cost. Patriots became politicians. Reformers became warlords. Now at Wuchang, the ancient walled city anchoring the metropolis to the Yangtze, they fight to the death.Former comrades and broken families watch each other through iron crosshairs. For Chiang Kai‑shek’s unproven government forces camped outside, victory means a chance at national salvation. For the ragtag Beiyang soldiers and citizenry trapped within, there is but one mission: stay alive.From the banks of the Mother River, the cold stone walls have seen entire dynasties unravelled in tides of senseless destruction. Will the living fare any better?

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The port of Tianjin is where the ancient Chinese empire met the sea. The turn of the 20th century was a tumultuous time for the city, with the Qing dynasty on its last legs and the Boxers unleashing their ill-fated rebellion against the European trading concessions that had colonised its streets.For Tianjin’s inhabitants, daily life carried on. These hardy people were shaped by the bitter earth from which they sprang, and every once in a while, there would emerge someone so remarkable that a new name would be inducted into Tianjin’s hall of fame.From a miracle doctor to an ill-mannered mynah bird, they came from every walk of life and in all shapes and sizes. Together, their stories make up the rich tapestry of a city that the modern world has washed away...

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The people of China tell of an ancient tale, where the mantis hunts the cicada, unaware of the yellow bird behind it. In a small corner of one of its many cities, a random act of violence sets off a spinning top, entwining the lives of three people.Baorun, the compulsive bondage expert, is forever aided and abetted by Liu Sheng, a brash troublemaker, to indulge in his obsessions; and the lady Fairy Princess, ever-youthful, becomes the target of the pair’s escalating antics.As the years pass, many things begin to change, but in the dysfunctional world of a mental hospital at the end of Red Toon Street, just who is prey, and who is predator?Often insightful and occasionally unsettling, Shadow of the Hunter is a memorable tale concerned with guilt, injustice, madness and the struggle not to lose one’s soul to history. It is one of Su Tong’s most acclaimed works, now available in English for the first time.

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A Man and His Horse is the story of a young man who is forced to flee Beijing during the Cultural Revolution. Coming from an intellectual family that is being torn apart by political campaigns, Wen Bo is barred from signing up with the Inner Mongolia Production and Construction Corps that he desperately wants to join in order to avoid the fate of being sent to an even poorer and more remote rural area. He decides to take a chance by sneaking aboard a train carrying new recruits bound for Inner Mongolia. Once there, deprived of the love of the girl who helped him escape, Wen Bo finds solace in a unique kind of love that he establishes with a feisty black horse.This autobiographical novel is based on the real-life experiences of a physician in Beijing. It shows how love, even one between a man and his horse, can compensate for what the Cultural Revolution tried to destroy.

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The Communist Party of China was founded in Shanghai in July 1921. From humble beginnings it has marched through war, revolution and reform to arrive at the helm of the most populous nation on the planet, commanding a membership of 92 million citizens.In the 100 years since its birth, the party and its leaders - from Mao Zedong in the early years to Xi Jinping today - have overcome an array of existential challenges. After formative years coordinating workers’ strikes and guerrilla warfare against their Nationalist opponents, the party played a pivotal role in breaking the might of the Imperial Japanese army. The following decades saw the CPC undergo ideological revisions and lift hundreds of millions out of poverty, developing China’s economy from poverty and backwardness into the world’s second largest. The party’s navigation of the deadly coronavirus pandemic marks the most recent chapter in this unique and striking saga of adaptation, survival and rejuvenation.This new edition is the latest in a series last translated to English in 1994. It offers readers the CPC’s official account of its own dramatic history – a narrative key to understanding the politics and policies of China in the 21st century.

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Trekking a Thousand Kilometres Across Nepal Walking is a posture, a way of self-cultivation and a way of life. It is a state of physical and spiritual freedom that anyone can achieve if their natural instincts are sincere and forthright. Pearl is a city girl, living a hectic life in one of China's most bustling cities. She thought herself incapable of walking a thousand kilometres to the roof of world. When asked how she mustered the courage to complete this great journey, she replies that she just took one step after another before eventually reaching her destination. No courage is needed in taking just a single step.

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At the age of 66, Ouyang Wantong, the former governor of Qinghe province, was too young to die. He touched the lives of so many people during his time on Earth. Some of them loved him intimately, while many more held him in the highest esteem. But there were also those who hated him and wished him dead. And now the battle to find his rightful place in the history books has begun…After the Finale is a fictional biography of an extraordinary man who grew up in poverty in China's Mao-era and then rose through the ranks of government during the country's period of reform and opening up. It's a tale of love, leadership, betrayal, corruption, lust, greed and the nature of power amid the rise of the 21st century's new superpower.

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Bowa is a young boy of the Tujia ethnic minority living in a small village outside Chongqing. A severe speech impediment means he can’t string two words together until after the age of ten, which prevents him from going to school and causes his fellow villagers, family and acquaintances to write him off as silly or dumb.But not being able to speak doesn’t stop him from dreaming and imagining. With the help of an enlightened supply teacher, who has volunteered to teach in this remote mountainous area, and help from a little white crane he befriends along the way, he eventually overcomes his speech impediment revealing a veritable child prodigy beneath the surface…

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In a cave high in the ageless mountains of China's desolate interior, an ancient funeral singer awaits the end. From his deathbed he gives voice to the generations of villagers to whom he devoted his life's work, and four all-too-human souls whose struggles defined an era. A soldier, a peasant, a revolutionary and a politician. When revolt and reform take hold of the wartorn plains, all play their debased roles in the mythic cycle of avarice, vengeance and suffering. As his four tragedies interweave, the cracked lips of the dying sage conjure a stark vision: a retelling of the forging of the People's Republic from turbulent birth to absurd reversal whispered from its uncharted margins.

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Despite her humble rural beginnings, Butterfly regards herself as a sophisticated young woman. So, when offered a lucrative job in the city, she jumps at the chance.But instead of being given work, she is trafficked and sold to Bright Black, a desperate man from a poor mountain village.Trapped in Bright’s cave home with her new “husband”, she plans her escape… not so easily done in this isolated and remote village where she is watched day and night.Will her tenacity and free spirit survive, or will she be broken?

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Old blood feuds on the Tibetan plateau flare up when seven children and their Tibetan mastiff, Gangri Senge, follow a Han journalist to a rival tribe’s territory during the early days of the People’s Republic of China. As the tribe plots to punish the children for their forefathers’ crimes, it is up to Gangri Senge and the journalist who befriends him to rescue the children from a grisly fate.Based on first-hand accounts from author Yang Zhijun’s father, this tale follows the lives of Tibet’s legendary mastiffs as Gangri Senge and the dog-loving journalist struggle to save the captured children. Together they embark on an extraordinary journey across the vast Tibetan wilderness that will change the plateau and its tribes forever.Mastiffs of the Plateau is a fascinating glimpse into a bygone era and a moving tale of love and loyalty that explores what it means to be human in a world filled with beasts.

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What is it like to suffer from depression? As Li Lanni writes, it's worse than cancer. A child of China's Cultural Revolution, Li Lanni has always persevered through hardship. Despite her many health struggles, including cancer, Lanni went through life with a smile on her face--until she was diagnosed with depression in 2003. This powerful memoir, told in part through diary entries written soon after her diagnosis, follows the extraordinary story of her life, from her upbringing on communist military bases to her coming of age in the high-pressure, freewheeling commercial centre of Shenzhen. At once deeply personal and profoundly universal, this story of cancer and mental illness captures the life and times of a generation struggling for health and happiness in a rapidly changing China.

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In the early years of the second world war, Japan had the upper hand in the Pacific theatre. Thousands of Allied servicemen were captured and endured brutal treatment – many died, and most of the survivors were held until war’s end in August 1945.This book tells the story of the men who were incarcerated at the Mukden POW camp in northeast China, which was designated for prisoners with special technical skills and high-ranking officers. They included troops from British and Dutch territories and Australia, but the majority were Americans who had been captured in the Philippines and taken part in the infamous Bataan Death March.Based on extensive field research and interviews with former POWs, Yang Jing’s harrowing account of life in the Mukden camp provides detailed evidence of the crimes perpetrated by the Japanese during the second world war, as well as a Chinese perspective on a fascinating period of history.

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Jean de Miribel arrived in China in July 1976. The tall, genial foreign-language expert joined the Xi’an International Studies University (XISU) that September, and immediately worked to inspire students to share a passion for literature and science.He adopted China and its people as his family and received admiration and respect from students and colleagues. He worked tirelessly, even in retirement, to build a Sino-French cultural exchange, and inviting friends in France and China to speak and spread ideas.The Chinese name he took for himself was Mi Ruizhe (米睿哲) – mi which literally means uncooked rice while his given names rui and zhe mean wise and far-sighted or astute.His belief in education saw him develop the language studies at XISU, sponsor children through primary school, and help students from China to study overseas. Although he lived a very frugal life himself, he was extremely generous when it came to subsidising Chinese students in destitute mountainous regions to studying in France.He received many honours, including the Légion d’Honneur, as well as tokens of esteem and affection from students, friends and neighbours.Jean de Miribel left a legacy of cross-cultural understanding and respect. The last wish of the Frenchman known in his ‘adopted’ country as a ‘a person who has performed good deeds for China’ was to donate his body for medical research after he passed away at the age of 96 in Xi’an on 10 October 2015.

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As the first Chinese female scientist to win a Nobel prize (in physiology or medicine) in 2015, what were Tu Youyou’s formative experiences and the major events that shaped her life? How did this remarkable woman − without a medical degree, doctorate or overseas work experience – makesuch a valuable contribution to the control of malaria? This book explores the extraordinary career of this modest, frugal and very unconventional scientist and records her inspirational work.During early clinical trials, Tu traveled to malaria-endemic areas of Hainan and was the first to test her medicine on herself to ensure it was safe after the drug had shown promising results in mice and monkeys. Only then were the clinical trials expanded to include other humans.Afflicted with tuberculosis at the age of 16, Tu Youyou recovered two years later with a determination to make up for lost time. In fact, the illness was the making of her in that it sparked an interest in medicine and pharmacology and a desire to help save the lives of others. Indifferent to fame and wealth, and courageous in the pursuit of truth, she went on to make remarkable scientific achievements.Although born in Ningbo at a time of turmoil, Tu Youyou was among the first intake of female college students in the new China. She made the most of this good fortune by devoting herself to decades of quiet and patient labor in which she embraced Chairman Mao Zedong’s quest for the country to combine traditional Chinese medicine and western medicine.Separated from her family, she led a national research group codenamed ‘Mission 523’ tasked with developing antimalarial drugs from Chinese medicines. Exposing themselves to considerable hardship and danger, the team’s pioneering work led to the discovery of artemisinin, a drug therapy that has since saved millions of lives across the globe, especially in developing countries.

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Ren Zhongyi was criticised and struggled against no less than 2,300 times from the start of the Cultural Revolution. So many years of violent attacks against him that were enough to break lesser men merely caused Ren to strengthen his resolve and bide his time to work on what he regarded as his mission in life: to modernise the country and make it strong. Ren was so often able to balance steely determination to adopt innovative methods to get the job done with a pragmatic willingness not to be so stubborn and unbending as to alienate those who opposed him.Ren Zhongyi: Frontline Fighter and Economic Reformer is a fascinating and moving account of this pioneer of economic reform in China, who played such an important role in transforming the southern province of Guangdong and opening up the country to the outside world.

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For generations, Wang Changchi's family have dreamed of escaping their poverty-stricken village. When a twist of fate takes his chance away, he joins the hordes of illegal migrant workers risking their lives for a shot at city life. Still hoping for a reversal of fortune, will he risk it all for one more chance to bring success to his family?

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*Missives from the Masses *opens award-winning author Su Tong's newest selection of short stories. From Qianmei, the only one in the dark about her terminal cancer, to the unloved undertaker with seemingly cursed hands, this collection presents darkly humorous and strange accounts of hidden lives eked out during China's turbulent economic rise.

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His mission to better the lot of Peking’s citizens has put Fang Meng’ao on the radar of Inspector General Zeng Keda, the fearsome and ruthless commander responsible for maintaining order in the city. Naturally suspicious of Communists, his hunt for revolutionaries ensnares the young maverick.The city has become a snake pit of treachery and double-dealing. Desperate measures, such as the currency reforms implemented by the Central Bank governor, plaster over the cracks of a fracturing society.Out on the streets, the intellectual Yang Jinglun helps organise student protests and rebellions for those accused of siding with the Reds. With the nation embroiled in full-blown civil war, the tension builds and Fang Meng’ao becomes desperate. Can he evade Zeng Keda’s suspicious eyes?* Or will he fall prey to one of the many traps set in the city?*

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An ailing mother forces Nuannuan to abandon her cherished metropolitan life and return to Chu Wang. Once there, she finds her birthplace fragmented and forgotten by modernity. Despite warnings, she quickly reconnects with Kaitian, a childhood sweetheart.The village is centred around Red Lake, whose misty shores once provided solace to ancient kings and their entourages. The couple unearth forgotten treasures left behind from this royal past and are quick to capitalise, setting off a boom in tourism.Word of the lake’s beauty spreads, attracting rampant outsider investment and infecting the sleepy village with dark tastes and unsettling appetites. Drunk on power, the newly elected mayor quickly starts to reshape Chu Wang to his own corrupt ends. Determined to share in this new abundance, will the villagers swap one type of poverty for another?

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Morning brings new and old faces to Hai Ruo’s teashop. The premium leaves she sells to Xijing’s high society keep the doors open, however it’s her Sisterhood – a dozen glamorous confidants who visit daily to share tales of love, loss and professional success – that really keeps the shop running.From a returning Russian expat to a hotpot tycoon, they epitomise the new possibilities of this ancient metropolis. The group's rise in business and society is sometimes helped by Yi Guang, a noted writer with his own artistic demons. But with every deal struck and official bribed, a debt accumulates, jeopardising a hard-won but brittle autonomy.The gates of Hai’s establishment help keep the choking smog of the city at bay, and inside she provides a sanctuary for the friends to express their true selves. If only the tea leaves held all the answers. Instead, it’s up to the sisters to discover how far their bonds will really hold.

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1900. For Tianjin’s European colonists a profitable new century is dawning, but for the city’s downtrodden Chinese natives the Zodiac cycle’s end signals imminent catastrophe. Meanwhile the fearsome Boxer warriors – said by some to be bulletproof – are spilling in from the provinces.On restless streets, a dangerous liaison begins. Ouyang Jue, gentle layabout and heir to a merchant fortune, finds himself entangled with Xénia, a French officer’s daughter indulging every impulse on her first visit to China. Each sees liberation in the other; a chance to leap through the mirror and escape the mundane.Separated by the widening divide between their two worlds, the lovers were never meant to be. But as discontent sparks into all-out conflagration, will they find paradise behind the glass? Or will they join the ashes of what might have been?

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