Braised Pork

“Braised Pork” is the debut novel by Chinese writer An Yu, which immediately attracted media attention and received positive reviews. It is a novel about the spiritual journey of a Chinese artist who finds herself in a difficult situation after her husband’s death. With artistic precision, An Yu paints contemporary Beijing and Tibet in mesmerizing, surreal images. She will lead you into a mysterious world of water from which it is almost impossible to find an exit… In this book, amazingly harmonious, captivating pictures of the East appear before us. Soot-choked Beijing leaves a lingering taste of surrealism, while the tulip fields of night Tibet enchant with their mysterious, mythological beauty. It all begins on the day Jia Jia discovers her husband drowned in the bathtub. After him, the wife is left with an empty apartment and a sketch of a mysterious fish-man—the one who appears to her husband in a dream during his trip to Tibet. And Jia Jia is sure that it is this creature that at night draws her into a frightening, yet so alluring world of water… Alone, having lost her footing, Jia Jia sets off on a journey to finally find herself.