Nine Continents: A Memoir In and Out of China
About this ebook
The acclaimed author of A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers and I Am China, Xiaolu Guo grew up an unwanted child in a poor fishing village on the East China Sea. But a Taoist monk made a startling prediction to her grandmother: that Guo would prove herself to be a peasant warrior and grow up to travel the nine continents.
In Nine Continents, Guo tells the story of a curious mind coming of age in an inhospitable country, and her determination to seek a life beyond the limits of its borders. From her family's village to a rapidly changing Beijing, to a life beyond China, Nine Continents presents a fascinating portrait of how the Cultural Revolution shaped families, and how the country's economic ambitions have given rise to great change. This "moving and often exhilarating" memoir confirms Xiaolu Guo as one of world literature's most urgent voices ( Financial Times, UK).
Discover more
About the author
Xiaolu Guo was born in south China. She studied film at the Beijing Film Academy and published six books in China before she moved to London in 2002. The English translation of Village of Stone was shortlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize and nominated for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Her first novel written in English, A Concise Chinese-English Dictionary for Lovers was shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction, and Twenty Fragments of a Ravenous Youth, published in 2008, was longlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize. Her most recent novel, I Am China, was longlisted for the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction. In 2013 she was named one of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists. Xiaolu has also directed several award-winning films including She, A Chinese and a documentary about London, Late at Night. She lives in London and Berlin.
