Showing results by author "An Yu" in All Categories

We are being watched. That this statement no longer shocks is itself shocking. Post-Snowden, we know that the government - everywhere - has been reading our emails, listening to our phone calls, and watching whatever we do on the Internet. The only thing concealed is the nature of our watchers. In Watchlist, some of today's most prominent and promising fiction writers from around the globe respond to, reflect on, and mine for inspiration the surveillance culture in which we live.

Natalie Kon-yu was nine weeks pregnant when the trembling began. Two weeks later she checked herself into a mental health unit. Though she was in crisis, the GPs, nurses and psychiatrists couldn't see beyond Natalie's precious cargo. She was made to feel that her pregnancy outweighed her mental health. This loss of agency lingered long into her early years of motherhood. In that time, she discovered that she was far from alone. In fact, her experience typifies the harsh inequalities endured by child-bearing women, as well as the devaluation of what is still perceived as ‘women's work'.

Girl is spending the summer at an artist's residency in Scotland. Far from her home in Australia and her tight-knit Malaysian family, she is meant to be writing a postcolonial novel and working on a PhD on the poetry of Sylvia Plath. But she can't stop thinking about her upbringing and the stories of her parents and grandmother who raised her. How can she reconcile their dreams for her with her lived reality?

Victims all describe hearing a voice before they die gruesomely. Sometimes it’s singing an old Taiwanese song, sometimes it’s in Japanese, and sometimes it’s an anguished call for help from a loved one. Can Wu Shih-sheng, a degenerate taxi driver in Taipei, hunt down the source of the voice that killed his wife before he becomes the next victim?

Few know more about what goes on in Singapore than Aunty Lee. When a scandal over illegal organ donation involving prominent citizens makes news, she already has a list of suspects. There's no time to snoop, though - Aunty Lee's Delights is catering a brunch for local socialites Henry and Mabel Sung at their opulent house. Rumor has it that the Sung's fortune is in trouble, and Aunty Lee wonders if the gossip is true. But soon after arriving at the Sung's house, her curiosity turns to suspicion. Why is a storage house she discovers locked?

When Derek Yu released Spelunky for free in 2008, his roguelike-inspired platformer took the indie game community by storm with its combination of classic platform mechanics, extreme difficulty, and random level generation. Four years later, Spelunky's HD remake went on to become PC Gamer's Game of the Year and earn perfect scores from Polygon and Eurogamer. But how is a "perfect" game made?

Su Lin is doing her dream job: assistant at Singapore's brand-new detective agency. Until Bald Bernie decides a 'local girl' can't be trusted with private investigations and replaces her with a new secretary - pretty, privileged, and white. So Su Lin's not the only person finding it hard to mourn Bernie after he's found dead in the filing room. And when her best friend's dad is accused, she gets up to some sleuthing work of her own in a bid to clear his name.

Mirza, a secretive neighbour of the Chens in Japanese Occupied Singapore, is a known collaborator and blackmailer. So when he is murdered in his garden, clutching a branch of mimosa, the suspects include local acquaintances, Japanese officials - and his own daughters. Su Lin's Uncle Chen is among those rounded up by the Japanese as reprisal. Hideki Tagawa, a former spy expelled by Police Officer Le Froy and a power in the new regime, offers Su Lin her uncle's life in exchange for using her fluency in languages and knowledge of locals to find the real killer.

When a young couple accidentally comes into possession of a playful kitten, their daily routine (and cramped apartment) is turned upside down. Soon they find their existence forever altered. Charting the couple’s ever-evolving relationship with cats – some they live with, others who exist only in their imagination – Invisible Kitties is a meditation on the quiet moments of everyday life and a celebration of cats in all their many forms.

From one of China’s most famous contemporary writers, here is a stunning collection of stories, selected from the best of Yu Hua’s early work, that shows his far-reaching influence on a pivotal period in Chinese literature. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Yu Hua and other young Chinese writers began to reimagine their national literature. Departing from conventional realism in favor of a more surreal and subjective approach inspired by Kafka, Faulkner, and Borges, the boundary-pushing fiction of this period reflected the cultural changes sweeping the world’s most populous nation.

Sisters Lu and Min have always understood their places as princesses of the Empire. Lu knows she is destined to become the dynasty's first female ruler while Min is resigned to a life in her shadow. Then their father declares their male cousin Set the heir instead - a betrayal that sends the sisters down two very different paths. Determined to reclaim her birthright, Lu goes on the run. She needs an ally - and an army - if she is to succeed. Her quest leads her to Nokhai, the last surviving wolf shape-shifter.

Evelyn Chang and her husband were vacationing in the Philippines when they were ambushed by terrorists. Evelyn’s husband was killed. She was kidnapped and disappeared into the lawless netherworld of the Sulu Archipelago. There was no hope of a rescue. Former Green Beret Gene Yu was five years out of the military, unemployed, and struggling with his transition back to the real world when Evelyn’s family asked for help. His improbable mission: infiltrate one of the most dangerous corners of the world and get her back. Alone.

The Aaron Beyond Podcast with Aaron Yu explores the world outside my own head with curiosity rather than apprehension. One of the biggest milestones I've had to reach in my life was cutting the excuses and taking full accountability for my thoughts and actions. Since then my life has become a lot better by all accounts. I know I'm not the only one who's realized this. Where are all these people? The more people I meet, the more I value the human experience, the more I see flaws as quirks, and, honestly, the more I stop judging myself and just give myself a break for simply being human. Life is...

When the Hart-Celler Act passed in 1965, opening up US immigration to non-Europeans, it ushered in a whole new era. But even to the first generation of Asian Americans born in the US after that milestone, it would have been impossible to imagine that sushi and boba would one day be beloved by all, that a Korean boy band named BTS would be the biggest musical act in the world, that one of the most acclaimed and popular movies of 2018 would be Crazy Rich Asians, or that we would have an Asian American Vice President.

In The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories, you can dine at a restaurant at the end of the universe, cultivate to immortality in the high mountains, watch roses perform Shakespeare, or arrive at the island of the gods on the backs of giant fish to ensure that the world can bloom. Written, edited, and translated by a female and nonbinary team, these stories have never before been published in English and represent both the richly complicated past and the vivid future of Chinese science fiction and fantasy.

Ancient China. Spoiled and overconfident, 18-year-old Mu Feng relishes life as the son of an honored general. But when his sister is abducted and his friends slaughtered, he flees home. He soon discovers the mystical birthmark on his body has attracted an enormous price on his head. Pursued across the Middle Kingdom, Feng finds allies in two fierce warriors and a beautiful assassin.

DESPRE AUDIOBOOK. Cum arată viața cuiva care nu se simte protagonistul propriei existențe? Care sunt constrângerile unei astfel de vieți? Ce și până unde îi este permis să viseze? Willis Wu și-a dorit dintotdeauna să fie Tipul Care Se Pricepe La Kung Fu, dar până una alta, trebuie să se mulțumească cu a fi unul dintre miile de Bărbați Asiatici Generici care-și găsesc un rost pe platourile de filmare ale serialelor polițiste de la Hollywood. Își va îndeplini el visul, va reuși el să-și găsească locul în marea narațiune americană și dacă da, cu ce preț?

On the run from an abusive man, Megan Liu and her mom find work cleaning an ancient Beijing opera house in exchange for room and board. Meeting Kristy, the lead performer of the theater’s current show, ignites Megan’s long-buried singing ambition. But Kristy’s hiding something; and digging into her secrets, Megan uncovers more mysteries—including her mom’s childhood connection to the theater and a decades-old murder. The more Megan learns, the more her dreams and reality begin to blur. Something’s calling her from deep within the opera house, and it’s ravenous…

On the night of the Hungry Ghost Moon, when spirits can briefly return to the living world, Jodi Wu and her best friend sneak into Portland’s Chinese Garden and Ghost Museum. Kneeling before the pond where Jodi’s toddler drowned one year before, they leave food offerings and burn joss paper—and Jodi prays that Ella’s ghost will return for the night. To distract Jodi from her grief, the two friends tell each other ghost stories as they explore the museum.

Perspectives with Wenchi Yu presents on-the-ground views from Asia about Trump 2.0's policies and politics and their implications for China, Taiwan, Asia, and beyond. Wenchi Yu interviews business and political leaders with deep experience working on and living in the Asia Pacific region.