Yan Ge

In the fictional Chinese city of Yong'an, an amateur cryptozoologist is tasked with uncovering the stories of its fabled beasts, which draws her deep within a mystery that threatens her very sense of self.

Strange Beasts of China

From multi-award-winning author Yan Ge, a shimmering, genre-bending English-language debut that announces the next phase in a major literary career. In twenty years, Yan Ge has authored thirteen books written in Chinese, working across an impressive range of genres and subjects. Now, Yan Ge transposes her dynamic storytelling onto another linguistic landscape. The result is a collection humming with her trademark wit and style—and with the electricity of a seasoned artist flexing her virtuosity with a new medium. A young woman bonds with an encampment of poets after a devastating earthquake. Against her better judgment, a college student begins to fall for an acquaintance who might be dead. And a Confucian disciple returns to the Master bearing a jar full of grisly remains. Weaving between reality and dreamy surreality, these nine stories wend toward elsewhere, a comforting, frustrating, just-out-of-reach place familiar to anyone who has ever experienced longing. Through it all Yan Ge’s protagonists peer thoughtfully at their own feelings of displacement—physical or emotional, the result of travel, emigration, or exile. Brilliant and irresistibly readable, Elsewhere explores the utility (or not) of art in the face of lonesomeness, quotidian, and spectacular. This highly anticipated collection is further proof that Yan Ge is a generational literary talent, to be watched closely for decades to come.

Stories

Elsewhere

“Vivid,—White Horse—mesmerizes from page one as events unfold through the unassuming lenses of a child’s mind. In recounting how young n n is trying to make sense of real life experiences in an adult world, Author Yan Ge weaves a fascinating tale of receptive hearts, rebellious spirits and hidden secrets infused with cultural values in this small Chinese community.” Lema Abeng-Nsah, Publisher and Editorial Director of—Dunia Magazine—Young, innocent n n lives with her widower father in a small town in West China but spends half of her time at her cousin Zhang Qing's house, where they play and hide from the adults. However, n n's world starts to shatter when Quing enters middle school and turns into a rebellious teenager. As all things collide and family secrets begin to unravel, n n is quietly forced into growing up herself. A powerful coming-of-age tale with piercing insights into contemporary Chinese culture, acclaimed novelist Yan Ge's—White Horse—is both a touching and thought-provoking story. REVIEWS:Yan Ge is a master of extreme realism. This is something already recognised in her native country - China - where she has won the Chinese Literature Media Prize. Nicky Harman’s translation has opened up the text for an English speaking audience. Overall White Horse is a typical example of a bildungsroman. It follows n n, via her childish voice, through a quagmire of growing pains. On another level the book is also interesting as a cultural document. For such a short book, Ge certainly manages to take on a wide range of themes. She looks at death, lack of identity, young lesbian experiences, mental illness and social welfare. The novella is a good read as a social study as much as it is a story. (CADAVERINE Magazine)

White Horse

Nicky Harman

'Full of depth. . . wonderful writing.' SARAH HALL 'Dazzlingly good. . . crackling with playfulness and intelligence.' DANIELLE McLAUGHLIN 'Precise, surreal and emotionally devastating' LUCY CALDWELL 'How do you know this is all real and happening? How can you be sure you haven't already died in the earthquake and are just living in the afterlife?' In her highly anticipated English-language debut, Yan Ge explores isolation in nine iridescent, witty and wondrous tales. Both contemporary and ancient, real and surreal, the stories in Elsewhere range from China to Dublin to London and Stockholm. From a group of writers lounging on the edge of a disaster zone to a mandarin ostracised from his old court trying to avoid assassination, and from a woman who inexplicably loses her voice to a couple who meet all too fleetingly at a cinema in Dublin, these are strange and beguiling stories of dispossession, longing and the diasporic experience. 'Glorious' MIA GALLAGHER 'A gripping, stunning work, worldly and otherworldly.' MADELEINE THIEN 'Equal parts shimmering wit and startling emotional depth.' JEREMY TIAN 'One of the most surprising writers I've read in recent years. . . fantastic.' MATT BELL

'Wonderful writing' Sarah Hall

A New Yorker BEST BOOK of 2023 | MOST ANTICIPATED by Nylon • Rolling Stone • The Millions From multi-award-winning author Yan Ge, a shimmering, genre-bending English-language debut that announces the next phase in a major literary career. “As haunting, dreamlike, and addictive as a melatonin-induced slumber.” —Nylon “With wry humor and occasional earthy surrealism, Yan Ge...delicately renders both the linguistic and physical manifestations of longing.” —The New Yorker In twenty years, Yan Ge has authored thirteen books written in Chinese, working across an impressive range of genres and subjects. Now, Yan Ge transposes her dynamic storytelling onto another linguistic landscape. The result is a collection humming with her trademark wit and style—and with the electricity of a seasoned artist flexing her virtuosity with a new medium. A young woman bonds with an encampment of poets after a devastating earthquake. Against her better judgment, a college student begins to fall for an acquaintance who might be dead. And a Confucian disciple returns to the Master bearing a jar full of grisly remains. Weaving between reality and dreamy surreality, these nine stories wend toward elsewhere, a comforting, frustrating, just-out-of-reach place familiar to anyone who has ever experienced longing. Through it all Yan Ge’s protagonists peer thoughtfully at their own feelings of displacement—physical or emotional, the result of travel, emigration, or exile. Brilliant and irresistibly readable, Elsewhere explores the utility (or not) of art in the face of lonesomeness, quotidian, and spectacular. This highly anticipated collection is further proof that Yan Ge is a generational literary talent, to be watched closely for decades to come.

Yan Ge

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