The Years, Months, Days: Two Novellas
Yan Lianke
(Author)
Carlos Rojas
(Translator)
Description
Yan Lianke--"China's most feted and most banned author" (Financial Times)--is a master of imaginative satire, and his prize-winning works have been published around the world to the highest honors. Now, his two most acclaimed novellas are collected here in a single volume--masterfully crafted stories that explore the sacrifices made for family, the driving will to survive, and the longing to leave behind a personal legacy. Marrow is the haunting tale of a widow who goes to extremes to provide a normal life for her four disabled children. When she discovers that bones--especially those of kin--can cure their illnesses and prevent future generations from the same fate, she feeds them a medicinal soup made from the skeleton of her dead husband. But after running out of soup, she resorts to a measure that only a mother can take. In the luminous, moving title story, The Years, Months, Days--a bestselling, classic fable in China, and winner of the prestigious Lu Xun Literary Prize--an elderly man stays behind in his small village after a terrible drought forces everyone to leave. Unable to make the grueling march through the mountains, he becomes the lone inhabitant, along with a blind dog. As he fends off the natural world from overtaking his hometown, every day is a victory over death. With touches of the fantastical and with deep humanity, these two magnificent novellas--masterpieces of the short form--reflect the universality of mankind's will to live, live well, and live with purpose.Product Details
Price
$16.00
$14.72
Publisher
Grove Press
Publish Date
December 05, 2017
Pages
155
Dimensions
5.5 X 0.8 X 8.2 inches | 0.5 pounds
Language
English
Type
Paperback
EAN/UPC
9780802126658
BISAC Categories:
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About the Author
Yan Lianke is the author of numerous story collections and novels, including The Explosion Chronicles, which was longlisted for the Man Booker International and PEN Translation Prize, The Four Books, Lenin's Kisses, Serve the People!, and Dream of Ding Village. Among many accolades, he was awarded the Franz Kafka Prize, he was twice a finalist for the Man Booker International Prize, and he has been shortlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize, the Man Asian Literary Prize, and the Prix Femina Étranger. He has received two of China's most prestigious literary honors, the Lu Xun Prize and the Lao She Award.
Reviews
Praise for The Years, Months, Days * A New York Times Editors' Choice
* One of Bookforum's Best Book of the Year, chosen by Colm TóibÃn "Yan Lianke creates imaginary wounds in real blood . . . His books read like the brutal folklore history couldn't bear to remember." --New York Times Book Review "Filled with a deep melancholy mixed with a ghostly comedy and a rare sort of narrative energy. Utterly unpredictable and brilliantly weird." --Colm TóibÃn, Bookforum "[Yan's] characters inhabit a bleak, harsh world. In bitterly hard circumstances, they show courage and ingenuity, defiance and grace. His renderings of real-world desolations are imaginative and wondrous; these austere fables are minimal, but beautifully composed." --Shelf Awareness "The Years, Months, Days finds the Chinese master at the top of his game . . . His satirical eye and generous heart are finely rendered." --Toronto Star "[Yan's novellas] showcase his hallucinatory imagination and satiric wit." --BBC "Lianke paints vivid scenes of desolate circumstances with an incredible mastery of words and control of his imagery. His masterpieces are sure to engage readers." --Booklist (starred review) "These two compelling novellas both exalt emotional bonds and warn against their fatal consequences . . . this work again directs the author's unflinching gaze on life's impossible absurdities, exposing a surreal mixture of brutality, openness, even sly humor." --Library Journal (starred review) "Lianke's talent for the fantastical shines in this collection of two novellas . . . Though they contain dark subject matter, Lianke's fables of personal sacrifice are also sharply observed and funny. Lianke's narratives feel much larger than their page count suggest, almost epic." --Publishers Weekly (starred review) "Apocalyptic, eerie visions in two novellas by much-honored Chinese writer Yan . . . Inspired, one imagines, by the terrible headlines of famine, climate change, and simple uncertainty; Yan draws on the conventions of folklore and science fiction alike to produce memorable literature." --Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
* One of Bookforum's Best Book of the Year, chosen by Colm TóibÃn "Yan Lianke creates imaginary wounds in real blood . . . His books read like the brutal folklore history couldn't bear to remember." --New York Times Book Review "Filled with a deep melancholy mixed with a ghostly comedy and a rare sort of narrative energy. Utterly unpredictable and brilliantly weird." --Colm TóibÃn, Bookforum "[Yan's] characters inhabit a bleak, harsh world. In bitterly hard circumstances, they show courage and ingenuity, defiance and grace. His renderings of real-world desolations are imaginative and wondrous; these austere fables are minimal, but beautifully composed." --Shelf Awareness "The Years, Months, Days finds the Chinese master at the top of his game . . . His satirical eye and generous heart are finely rendered." --Toronto Star "[Yan's novellas] showcase his hallucinatory imagination and satiric wit." --BBC "Lianke paints vivid scenes of desolate circumstances with an incredible mastery of words and control of his imagery. His masterpieces are sure to engage readers." --Booklist (starred review) "These two compelling novellas both exalt emotional bonds and warn against their fatal consequences . . . this work again directs the author's unflinching gaze on life's impossible absurdities, exposing a surreal mixture of brutality, openness, even sly humor." --Library Journal (starred review) "Lianke's talent for the fantastical shines in this collection of two novellas . . . Though they contain dark subject matter, Lianke's fables of personal sacrifice are also sharply observed and funny. Lianke's narratives feel much larger than their page count suggest, almost epic." --Publishers Weekly (starred review) "Apocalyptic, eerie visions in two novellas by much-honored Chinese writer Yan . . . Inspired, one imagines, by the terrible headlines of famine, climate change, and simple uncertainty; Yan draws on the conventions of folklore and science fiction alike to produce memorable literature." --Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
