Mo Yan

When Special Investigator Ding Gou'er arrives in the fictional province of Liquorland, the air reeks of coal and liquor. Tasked with investigating rumours that local officials are practising cannibalism, he transforms from observer to participant in the bacchanalian rounds of lavish banquets and intemperate drinking. Unable to keep up with Diamond Jin, an official with a notorious capacity for holding...

During China's collectivist era in the late 1950s, a rural work team set to repair a river floodgate receives a new labour recruit—Hei-hai, a skinny, sorry, silent boy. Assigned to pump the bellows at the worksite forge, Hei-hai proves indifferent to pain or suffering, but eerily sensitive to the beauties of the natural world. As the worksite becomes embroiled in...