What do you think?
Rate this book
Calico Series #3
That We May Live
The first book in the new Calico series from Two Lines Press, That We May Live represents the vanguard of speculative fiction being published in China today with seven stories that are utterly disorienting yet disturbingly familiar
A woman impulsively decides to visit her grandmother in a scene reminiscent of “Little Red Riding Hood,” only to find herself in a town of women obsessed with a mysterious fermented beverage. An aging and well-respected female newscaster at a provincial TV station finds herself caught up in an illicit affair with her boss, who insists that she recite the news while they have sex. An anonymous city prone to vanishing storefronts begins to plant giant mushrooms for its citizens to live in, with disastrous consequences.
In this first book in the brand-new Calico Series, we bring you work by some of today’s most exciting writers from China and Hong Kong, including Dorothy Tse (tr. Natascha Bruce), Zhu Hui (tr. Michael Day), and Enoch Tam (tr. Jeremy Tiang). Lightly touching on issues of urbanization, sexuality, and propaganda, the collection builds a world both utterly disorienting and disturbing familiar, prompting the question: Where does reality end and absurdity begin in a world pushed to its very limits?
A woman impulsively decides to visit her grandmother in a scene reminiscent of “Little Red Riding Hood,” only to find herself in a town of women obsessed with a mysterious fermented beverage. An aging and well-respected female newscaster at a provincial TV station finds herself caught up in an illicit affair with her boss, who insists that she recite the news while they have sex. An anonymous city prone to vanishing storefronts begins to plant giant mushrooms for its citizens to live in, with disastrous consequences.
In this first book in the brand-new Calico Series, we bring you work by some of today’s most exciting writers from China and Hong Kong, including Dorothy Tse (tr. Natascha Bruce), Zhu Hui (tr. Michael Day), and Enoch Tam (tr. Jeremy Tiang). Lightly touching on issues of urbanization, sexuality, and propaganda, the collection builds a world both utterly disorienting and disturbing familiar, prompting the question: Where does reality end and absurdity begin in a world pushed to its very limits?
160 pages, Paperback
First published March 10, 2020
7 people are currently reading
634 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 38 reviews
July 9, 2020
"The essential idea behind Calico is, let's talk to the translators... find out what's interesting, what's not being published in English, what's percolating in other parts of the world that we haven't heard about yet. THAT WE MAY LIVE is a collection of speculative Chinese fiction... of unnerving, uncanny, weird stories about urbanization and late capitalism." - Chad Felix of Two Lines Press in this interview.
I've been reading these stories very slowly, just one every few days/weeks or so, since I shelved it next to my computer where I work all the time. They definitely feel like they are in conversation with other works from Asia, particularly South Korea, but that connection may be more about what has been translated vs. what hasn't been.
Sour Meat by Dorothy Tse
A surreal story about a stinky brew, also about women's bodies... would have loved some editor or translator notes with some context as it seems intentionally sexual as if it is trying to push boundaries, but what are the boundaries in China, I don't know....
Auntie Han's Modern Life by Enoch Tam
"Every time she came home, she felt as if it were to a different house on a different street."
garden-keepers cultivating skyscrapers
houses that move, houses that are depressed
Lip Service by Zhu Hui
Oof! A punchy tale of what a naturally beautiful woman has to be willing to do to stay on top.
The Elephant by Chan Chi Wa
Clearly in conversation with "The Elephant Vanishes" by Haruki Murakami, the narrator of this story has a similar emotional experience about an elephant but it has the added layer of living in a state of surveillance.
The Mushroom Houses Proliferated in District M by Enoch Tam
Continuing the themes of the earlier story by the same author, it's about the garden keepers and their war with the mushrooms.
A Counterfeit Life by Chen Si'an
"He started roaming around every corner of the city, searching for those spots in which people being waited for might fail to show up."
Flourishing Beasts by Yan Ge
Are you a [woman] or are you a [beast]?
I've been reading these stories very slowly, just one every few days/weeks or so, since I shelved it next to my computer where I work all the time. They definitely feel like they are in conversation with other works from Asia, particularly South Korea, but that connection may be more about what has been translated vs. what hasn't been.
Sour Meat by Dorothy Tse
A surreal story about a stinky brew, also about women's bodies... would have loved some editor or translator notes with some context as it seems intentionally sexual as if it is trying to push boundaries, but what are the boundaries in China, I don't know....
Auntie Han's Modern Life by Enoch Tam
"Every time she came home, she felt as if it were to a different house on a different street."
garden-keepers cultivating skyscrapers
houses that move, houses that are depressed
Lip Service by Zhu Hui
Oof! A punchy tale of what a naturally beautiful woman has to be willing to do to stay on top.
The Elephant by Chan Chi Wa
Clearly in conversation with "The Elephant Vanishes" by Haruki Murakami, the narrator of this story has a similar emotional experience about an elephant but it has the added layer of living in a state of surveillance.
The Mushroom Houses Proliferated in District M by Enoch Tam
Continuing the themes of the earlier story by the same author, it's about the garden keepers and their war with the mushrooms.
A Counterfeit Life by Chen Si'an
"He started roaming around every corner of the city, searching for those spots in which people being waited for might fail to show up."
Flourishing Beasts by Yan Ge
Are you a [woman] or are you a [beast]?
February 7, 2024
The anthology is subtitled "Speculative Chinese Fiction". I have to note that the blurb mentions "writers from China and Hong Kong"; wonder if that's a veiled political statement in these stressful times. Many speculative fiction fans would probably not consider most of the stories here to be in the genre. Jenny (Reading Envy)'s review (https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...) points to a YouTube interview with the publishers of Two Lines press; I haven't checked out the video, but perhaps it gives more context.
The book design is quite interesting. Each story starts with its own bilingual title page, with a quote from the story in both Chinese and English. In my experience, introducing the story with the short quote is more common in Chinese language fiction than Western fiction. The use of red in the margin, and in some of the text, is also quite attractive.
The opening story, Dorothy Tse's "Sour Meat", is much more of a weird tale in the post Vandermeer sense, than what I'd consider "speculative fiction". Tse's prose really benefits from a superior translation than the ones in her collection Snow and Shadow. While Tse's narrator still muses a lot (a complaint I have with a lot of contemporary Chinese language fiction), the translation is pretty smooth and free of the not infrequent gaffes in Snow and Shadow. The story winds its leisurely way to the uncomfortable closing sequence. The story title in Chinese is very clever and hard to translate: the first character is "meat", the second means "change", as in change in state, or metamorphosis, often implying food spoilage as well. Obviously it's not possible for "sour" to capture those nuances; there's certainly some metamorphoses going on in the story.
The quote from Tse's story, on the title page, illustrates beautifully how to translate prose like this (Natascha Bruce is the translator); a straight translation of the original Chinese sentence would seem unbearably overwrought in English. Enough is omitted, but the essential meanings remain, for an elegant outcome. Bruce also translated the new Ho Sok Fong novel, on my to-read list; now I'm itching to get to it.
I loved the central idea in Si'an Chen's "A Counterfeit Life", but am not a fan of the execution. The nondescript narrator accidentally starts a "career" of impersonating wedding banquet MCs, business cadres, etc, just by showing up in the right places. He eventually develops a whole crew of likeminded impersonators, who meet for "professional" networking and support, etc . At this point, I thought it would be perfect for the impersonator society to be infiltrated by an outsider impersonator impersonator; instead, Chen pivots into an uninteresting failed romance to end. The narrator also muses endlessly on banal pseudo-philosophical matters (one of my pet peeves), for a 30-page story. Si'an Chen is a playwright, so I suppose the musing might work as theatrical monologues. But they just go on for way too long here, in my opinion.
Enoch Tam's contributions here remind me of a kind of gentle urban surrealism that I've encountered in Hong Kong writers like Dorothy Tse and Lai-chu Hon. (Tam is also based in Hong Kong, and lists Hon as an influence.) I tend to like Tse and Hon's ideas more than the execution, or the translation when I've read these in English. I feel the same way about Tam's pieces. His prose can be rather verbose for my taste. It takes a deft translator like Natascha Bruce to get to the kind of clear and economical treatment that I prefer for these stories. Unfortunately I'm not a fan of the translations here (both by the same translator). "The Mushroom Houses Proliferated in District M" builds on a fun idea (growing gigantic mushrooms into houses, perhaps a reference to Hong Kong's dire problems with affordable housing and real-estate speculation). I can't say I'm a fan of how it's developed in only six pages, and the original (which I haven't read) is probably in a style that I would consider verbose. It doesn't help for the translation to include quite a few stilted moments.
The last story, Yan Ge's "Flourishing Beasts", is probably the closest to Western speculative fiction in terms of genre practices. The protagonist is a humanoid with plant-like characteristics during parts of her life cycle. The story is mostly about the protagonist's interactions with various humans, some of whom are interested in her romantically, told mostly through light-hearted banter and anecdotes. I quite enjoyed this, though there were clunky sections, mired in stilted explanations of the biological processes of the protagonist and her community.
So this is probably 2.5 stars, rounded up. The Dorothy Tse story (and translation) is definitely worth checking out; Yan Ge's story is also worth a look.
The book design is quite interesting. Each story starts with its own bilingual title page, with a quote from the story in both Chinese and English. In my experience, introducing the story with the short quote is more common in Chinese language fiction than Western fiction. The use of red in the margin, and in some of the text, is also quite attractive.
The opening story, Dorothy Tse's "Sour Meat", is much more of a weird tale in the post Vandermeer sense, than what I'd consider "speculative fiction". Tse's prose really benefits from a superior translation than the ones in her collection Snow and Shadow. While Tse's narrator still muses a lot (a complaint I have with a lot of contemporary Chinese language fiction), the translation is pretty smooth and free of the not infrequent gaffes in Snow and Shadow. The story winds its leisurely way to the uncomfortable closing sequence. The story title in Chinese is very clever and hard to translate: the first character is "meat", the second means "change", as in change in state, or metamorphosis, often implying food spoilage as well. Obviously it's not possible for "sour" to capture those nuances; there's certainly some metamorphoses going on in the story.
The quote from Tse's story, on the title page, illustrates beautifully how to translate prose like this (Natascha Bruce is the translator); a straight translation of the original Chinese sentence would seem unbearably overwrought in English. Enough is omitted, but the essential meanings remain, for an elegant outcome. Bruce also translated the new Ho Sok Fong novel, on my to-read list; now I'm itching to get to it.
I loved the central idea in Si'an Chen's "A Counterfeit Life", but am not a fan of the execution. The nondescript narrator accidentally starts a "career" of impersonating wedding banquet MCs, business cadres, etc, just by showing up in the right places. He eventually develops a whole crew of likeminded impersonators, who meet for "professional" networking and support, etc . At this point, I thought it would be perfect for the impersonator society to be infiltrated by an outsider impersonator impersonator; instead, Chen pivots into an uninteresting failed romance to end. The narrator also muses endlessly on banal pseudo-philosophical matters (one of my pet peeves), for a 30-page story. Si'an Chen is a playwright, so I suppose the musing might work as theatrical monologues. But they just go on for way too long here, in my opinion.
Enoch Tam's contributions here remind me of a kind of gentle urban surrealism that I've encountered in Hong Kong writers like Dorothy Tse and Lai-chu Hon. (Tam is also based in Hong Kong, and lists Hon as an influence.) I tend to like Tse and Hon's ideas more than the execution, or the translation when I've read these in English. I feel the same way about Tam's pieces. His prose can be rather verbose for my taste. It takes a deft translator like Natascha Bruce to get to the kind of clear and economical treatment that I prefer for these stories. Unfortunately I'm not a fan of the translations here (both by the same translator). "The Mushroom Houses Proliferated in District M" builds on a fun idea (growing gigantic mushrooms into houses, perhaps a reference to Hong Kong's dire problems with affordable housing and real-estate speculation). I can't say I'm a fan of how it's developed in only six pages, and the original (which I haven't read) is probably in a style that I would consider verbose. It doesn't help for the translation to include quite a few stilted moments.
The last story, Yan Ge's "Flourishing Beasts", is probably the closest to Western speculative fiction in terms of genre practices. The protagonist is a humanoid with plant-like characteristics during parts of her life cycle. The story is mostly about the protagonist's interactions with various humans, some of whom are interested in her romantically, told mostly through light-hearted banter and anecdotes. I quite enjoyed this, though there were clunky sections, mired in stilted explanations of the biological processes of the protagonist and her community.
So this is probably 2.5 stars, rounded up. The Dorothy Tse story (and translation) is definitely worth checking out; Yan Ge's story is also worth a look.
March 26, 2020
That We May Live IS a collection of Chinese speculative fiction in translation from Two Lines Press’ new Calico Series. It features seven short stories by six contemporary Chinese writers. Normally I’d share the name of the editor but here no editors’ names are specified anywhere in the book. Aren’t anthologies meant to have a preface or afterword? Without anything except the stories themselves and short bios of the authors and translators, this collection feels a bit adrift, with no context for its existence.
That aside, I did enjoy reading this collection. The stories were varied in how much they appealed to me, but since it's an anthology collecting work from multiple authors I was always excited to read the next one. This book is also immaculately constructed, for those aesthetically-minded among you, the bright orange title pages for each of the stories are beautiful, and I loved how they incorporate the title, author, translator, and a quote from each story.
These stories are not speculative in a straightforward SFF sense, they are surreal tales that often left me unsure about the takeaway, yet more often than not emotionally impacted. I feel these stories certainly speak to a cultural context that I’m unfamiliar with, and likely operate on a metaphorical level to which I’m missing the references. (Another reason I would have appreciated some commentary from an editor or the translators.) It stands alone fairly successfully nonetheless, and I’m so glad I picked up this collection to get these strange and fascinating tastes of the included authors’ writing.
My favorite stories were the first and last. Sour Meat by Dorothea Tse, translated by Natascha Bruce is one of the most unsettling stories I’ve read in a while, reminding me of Carmen Maria Machado or Samanta Schweblin. Flourishing Beasts by Yan Ge, translated by Jeremy Tiang, is a delicate and intriguing tale about these beings who grow from the earth like saplings and are cut down to be carved into beautiful furniture. I am excited after these introductions to seek out more of these two authors' work especially.
That aside, I did enjoy reading this collection. The stories were varied in how much they appealed to me, but since it's an anthology collecting work from multiple authors I was always excited to read the next one. This book is also immaculately constructed, for those aesthetically-minded among you, the bright orange title pages for each of the stories are beautiful, and I loved how they incorporate the title, author, translator, and a quote from each story.
These stories are not speculative in a straightforward SFF sense, they are surreal tales that often left me unsure about the takeaway, yet more often than not emotionally impacted. I feel these stories certainly speak to a cultural context that I’m unfamiliar with, and likely operate on a metaphorical level to which I’m missing the references. (Another reason I would have appreciated some commentary from an editor or the translators.) It stands alone fairly successfully nonetheless, and I’m so glad I picked up this collection to get these strange and fascinating tastes of the included authors’ writing.
My favorite stories were the first and last. Sour Meat by Dorothea Tse, translated by Natascha Bruce is one of the most unsettling stories I’ve read in a while, reminding me of Carmen Maria Machado or Samanta Schweblin. Flourishing Beasts by Yan Ge, translated by Jeremy Tiang, is a delicate and intriguing tale about these beings who grow from the earth like saplings and are cut down to be carved into beautiful furniture. I am excited after these introductions to seek out more of these two authors' work especially.
July 3, 2021
From this anthology of speculative Chinese fiction, my favourite stories were 'A Counterfeit Life' by Chen Si-an and 'Flourishing Beasts' by Yan Ge, the latter being far and away the best story here. (Special shoutout to the Singapore-born translator Jeremy Tiang for 'Flourishing Beasts'.) I hesitate to call this 'speculative fiction' because while the label can certainly be useful for marketing to Western audiences, it can also be a bit misleading. The stories here are speculative insofar as they are rooted in Chinese storytelling traditions that skew towards myth/parable. If they are 'speculative', it is only because contemporary Anglophone tastes gravitate towards psychological realism. It's all relative.
I was most taken by the brief excerpts of each story in Chinese and their rendering in English. The one by Zhu Hui ('Lip Service') was the most lush in Chinese, but the story was ultimately distasteful for its misogyny. I also enjoyed the terse staccato of the excerpt from 'Flourishing Beasts', which further emphasised its qualities as a parable. Definitely seeking out Yan Ge's linked short story collection now.
I was most taken by the brief excerpts of each story in Chinese and their rendering in English. The one by Zhu Hui ('Lip Service') was the most lush in Chinese, but the story was ultimately distasteful for its misogyny. I also enjoyed the terse staccato of the excerpt from 'Flourishing Beasts', which further emphasised its qualities as a parable. Definitely seeking out Yan Ge's linked short story collection now.
Some ideas can exist without a body for as long as you do not force yourself to summarise them in coherent language. Yet in the very instant - it could be at any moment, in any environment - that you endow them with a concrete form, they immediately translate themselves into the substance of your spirit.
- 'A Counterfeit Life', Chen Si-an
May 17, 2024
(3.5 stars) read my full review here: https://writingchinese.leeds.ac.uk/bo...
This collection of short stories is labelled as ‘speculative fiction’, a genre I am not so well read in, but I understand to focus on ‘possible’ futures that in some way depart from our own everyday experiences. In this way, these stories reminded me of 'I who have never known men' by Belgian author Jacqueline Harpman with their open-ended plots and capacity for multiple interpretations. The stories captivated me; I read them over two days on a trip to Copenhagen – it was the perfect coffee shop read (it paired very well with a pastry and a matcha latte).
These stories centre on the destruction of what is natural and an exploration on what has in modern times become society’s new ‘natural’. I would describe these tales as surrealist, disturbing and ambigious. Fantastical elements are contrasted against commentary on industrialisation and commercialisation. Absurdist aspects emphasise narratives of truth versus media. Unhinged protagonists challenge societal conventions through their diverging from the norm.
Overall, I felt the stories in this collection were translated masterfully, despite what I imagine would be the confusing, obscure, and ambiguous nature of the Chinese source text. The reading experience was a joy, even if I couldn’t always decipher what a particular story was about. As someone who is studying Chinese – English translation at the moment, I can only imagine how difficult it would be to translate such abstract stories, so I can only applaud the translators’ efforts. I did however come away from each story feeling slightly confused, and some of the stories left me wanting a bit more, but arguably this is the norm with short stories.
This collection of short stories is labelled as ‘speculative fiction’, a genre I am not so well read in, but I understand to focus on ‘possible’ futures that in some way depart from our own everyday experiences. In this way, these stories reminded me of 'I who have never known men' by Belgian author Jacqueline Harpman with their open-ended plots and capacity for multiple interpretations. The stories captivated me; I read them over two days on a trip to Copenhagen – it was the perfect coffee shop read (it paired very well with a pastry and a matcha latte).
These stories centre on the destruction of what is natural and an exploration on what has in modern times become society’s new ‘natural’. I would describe these tales as surrealist, disturbing and ambigious. Fantastical elements are contrasted against commentary on industrialisation and commercialisation. Absurdist aspects emphasise narratives of truth versus media. Unhinged protagonists challenge societal conventions through their diverging from the norm.
Overall, I felt the stories in this collection were translated masterfully, despite what I imagine would be the confusing, obscure, and ambiguous nature of the Chinese source text. The reading experience was a joy, even if I couldn’t always decipher what a particular story was about. As someone who is studying Chinese – English translation at the moment, I can only imagine how difficult it would be to translate such abstract stories, so I can only applaud the translators’ efforts. I did however come away from each story feeling slightly confused, and some of the stories left me wanting a bit more, but arguably this is the norm with short stories.
March 4, 2020
Some of these stories are solid 4-star stories. Most are fine. A couple are 2-stars.
My two favorites:
A Counterfeit Life by Chen Si'an: about a man who accidentally discovers he can make a good living by pretending to be the person others are waiting for it. It starts when he is mistaken for a late wedding MC. By loitering around different places and dressing in certain ways, he discovers people will often assume he is the person they are waiting for. He gets more daring and braver, and can pull of just about everything. And then he begins recruiting others that are down on their luck--just as he was--to do the same sort of thing.
Flourishing Beasts by Yan Ge: About a species of woman/tree, who live and are raised at The Temple of the Antiquities. They have human women there to help tend them, as the main character's mother did when she was a young woman.
————
Lip Service by Zhu Hui: there are quite a few sentences here that would fit right in on r/menwritingwomen
The Mushroom Houses Proliferated in District M by Enoch Tam: Interesting, but mushrooms are NOT plants (translation issue or from the original?). Mushrooms are fungi, and are actuaklly more closely related to humans than to plants. So, yeah.
My two favorites:
A Counterfeit Life by Chen Si'an: about a man who accidentally discovers he can make a good living by pretending to be the person others are waiting for it. It starts when he is mistaken for a late wedding MC. By loitering around different places and dressing in certain ways, he discovers people will often assume he is the person they are waiting for. He gets more daring and braver, and can pull of just about everything. And then he begins recruiting others that are down on their luck--just as he was--to do the same sort of thing.
Flourishing Beasts by Yan Ge: About a species of woman/tree, who live and are raised at The Temple of the Antiquities. They have human women there to help tend them, as the main character's mother did when she was a young woman.
————
Lip Service by Zhu Hui: there are quite a few sentences here that would fit right in on r/menwritingwomen
The Mushroom Houses Proliferated in District M by Enoch Tam: Interesting, but mushrooms are NOT plants (translation issue or from the original?). Mushrooms are fungi, and are actuaklly more closely related to humans than to plants. So, yeah.
February 12, 2020
It's always neat to be exposed to new cultures in translation and this is no exception. Calico, the new series from Two Lines, is off to an amazing start with THAT WE MAY LIVE -- a strange spin on temp work, stories of a city where its alphabetical districts have strange features like mushroom houses, an eerie fermented beverage that gives new meaning to "with the Mother", and more. I didn't love every story and found a few translation moments to be clunky, but on the whole this is a killer start to what will hopefully be a must-read series from Two Lines.
May 29, 2021
Interesting mix of short stories translated from Chinese, mostly in a style similar to magical realism. My favorite was the last one by Yan Ge which is a story about some very strange "people" that grow into trees with faces and are made into furniture. I suspect it is similar in style to her book Strange Beasts of China.
June 14, 2020
An oddly creepy anthology of contemporary short fiction from China and Hong Kong. A couple of stories didn't quite land with me, but the ones that did were wonderful. I love what Two Lines Press is doing with this book and can't wait to see what's next in their Calico series.
Read
January 12, 2026Colour me biased or whatever, but for me personally, Jeremy Tiang's translations are all 5/5. The rest didn't move me much. Happily surprised to see Yan Ge in the collection, but I've already read that a while back (from Strange Beasts of China) . I think the one featured in here is my favourite one as well, so it was an inevitably enjoyable re-read.
January 8, 2025
A bit hit or miss; the highs were highs and the mehs were mehs. None of the stories were bad, though. My favorites were A Counterfeit Life (Chen Si’an), Lip Service (Zhu Hui), and Flourishing Beasts (Yang Ge).
Overall I’d say the collection offered a good sampling of contemporary Chinese short-fiction. I wouldn’t exactly call it speculative; they’re all just a bit weird more than anything. This was my pretty much my first foray into Chinese literature (not counting the Three-Body Problem) and it’s definitely gotten me interested in reading more - all of these stories had a unique tone and cultural references that felt very unfamiliar to me, but were very thought-provoking. Anyways, I’m a bit bummed that Chen Si’an has literally nothing else translated in English (her contribution was by far my favorite).
Shoutout to Sonia for getting me this for my bday last year 😀
Overall I’d say the collection offered a good sampling of contemporary Chinese short-fiction. I wouldn’t exactly call it speculative; they’re all just a bit weird more than anything. This was my pretty much my first foray into Chinese literature (not counting the Three-Body Problem) and it’s definitely gotten me interested in reading more - all of these stories had a unique tone and cultural references that felt very unfamiliar to me, but were very thought-provoking. Anyways, I’m a bit bummed that Chen Si’an has literally nothing else translated in English (her contribution was by far my favorite).
Shoutout to Sonia for getting me this for my bday last year 😀
June 1, 2022
A strong collection of seven Chinese speculative tales. My favorites were Sour Meat by Dorothy Tse, translated by Natascha Bruce; The Mushroom Houses Proliferated in District M by Enoch Tam, translated by Jeremy Tiang; and Flourishing Beasts by Yan Ge, translated by Jeremy Tiang. Attractive volume included a paragraph on each of the translators in addition to the authors.
October 22, 2024
Calico Series of translated fiction returns. This time they bring Speculative Fiction from Chinese. Only one story really stood out for me.
Dorothy Tse - Sour Meat translated by Natascha Bruce. I can’t wait to read more from Tse.
Sour Meat hints at Little Red Riding Hood but the trip to grandma’s house turns to a mysterious fermented beverage and hallucinations into a reality of an unusual town.
Dorothy Tse - Sour Meat translated by Natascha Bruce. I can’t wait to read more from Tse.
Sour Meat hints at Little Red Riding Hood but the trip to grandma’s house turns to a mysterious fermented beverage and hallucinations into a reality of an unusual town.
Read
March 21, 2020Flourishing Beasts: 4 stars. I'd be interested in reading more work by Yan Ge.
I didn't like any of the other stories. To me a lot of them read like weirdness for the sake of being weird, and that seems to me like a writerly version of gluttony. Maybe I'm just not the right audience. (Although Lip Service was a decidedly awful story imo.)
I didn't like any of the other stories. To me a lot of them read like weirdness for the sake of being weird, and that seems to me like a writerly version of gluttony. Maybe I'm just not the right audience. (Although Lip Service was a decidedly awful story imo.)
February 2, 2020
I absolutely love speculative Chinese fiction, and this anthology definitely whet that particular appetite. Tales of absolute obscurity that enchant and entice, "That We May Live" is a beautifully woven collection that I recommend to everyone that loves the blending of absurdity and reality. This is definitely a collection for fans of Karen Russell, Max Porter, and Emily Tesh.
February 28, 2020
Since 1994, Two Lines Press has published translations, first as a biannual journal, then quarterly, and then the quarterly journal plus half-a-dozen books a year. With "That We May Live," they introduce a new series, Calico, that focuses on "one moment of the present moment" (whatever that means), in this case, seven "speculative fictions" from six contemporary Chinese authors, three from the mainland, three from Hong Kong. "Speculative fiction" here means something like the tales from "The Twilight Zone": often realistic, but with touch of the fable—minus ferries and elves—and its moral. The writing and translating here is fine, but the tales are hit-or-miss, especially if your taste for the speculative is usually indifferent. Alienation is a common theme—from work, from history, from domestic life, from familial and cultural expectations—and relevant to vanishing traditions (increasingly delegated to fading memory) and the encroaching sense that individual lives do not matter.
April 2, 2020
the final story, Flourishing Beasts by Yan Ge, is truly a stand out and worth the price of the book, though Sour Meat by Dorothy Tse and Auntie Han's Modern Life by Enoch Tam are also great reads. Sometimes I wondered if the translation caused some of the writing to fall flat, and a couple stories felt like they went completely over my head, but I liked the ones mentioned previously and could at least appreciate parts of the others.
May 5, 2024
I have a calico but she didn't seem to like it. This book has on the orange page after the first white page the word Calico under a picture of a cat. I think that's the name of the publisher house. My tortoiseshell cat appeared to like it better, but she doesn't want to comment for an interview at the moment, as it's her le naptime, just as I saw in that ridiculous Flash movie about how everyone was going to die, which was obnoxious so I am not going to put a link here. In any event, it seems to me that it's hard for her to intuit what exactly people are thinking, and I liked this collection, myself, and my opinion is what matters more than that of the cats, here.
I have also felt some days the same way as how one of the stories is called, like I have been living a counterfeit life, so that was my favourite of the collection, even with its mention at the beginning of the story of bearing cigarettes, but all seven of the stories are worth looking through when you have the chance.
My grandmother lived in the mushroom capital of my state, and I remember very clearly watching movies with my sister at her house when my parents were busy in the evenings throughout my early childhood, so I was also fond of that story, too - its title was The Mushroom Houses Proliferated in District M.
I have also felt some days the same way as how one of the stories is called, like I have been living a counterfeit life, so that was my favourite of the collection, even with its mention at the beginning of the story of bearing cigarettes, but all seven of the stories are worth looking through when you have the chance.
My grandmother lived in the mushroom capital of my state, and I remember very clearly watching movies with my sister at her house when my parents were busy in the evenings throughout my early childhood, so I was also fond of that story, too - its title was The Mushroom Houses Proliferated in District M.
November 11, 2021
To begin with, this book is a very beautiful object – its unusual, squarish format, the slightly cream colour of the paper, the type design and the elegant red title pages for each story made me want to like the writing immediately.
The writing is variable. The thinnest stories are those that are thinly disguised social satire – speculative builders make houses that really are giant mushrooms, an area of a city really does vanish and so forth. Others explore more imaginative premises, like the mysterious fermented tea that is only drunk by women.
But the last story suddenly reminds you of how good good writing can be. It is a self-contained chapter from Yan Ge's book "Strange Beasts of China". The way she handles a complex plot though its twists and turns, the ability to conjure up the sort of emotions that are hard to name precisely, and, above all, the way she draws you instantly into the story – the writing towers over the remainder of the anthology. Most of the other stories are interesting glimpses of contemporary China. Yan Ge's contribution is quite simply great writing.
My copy of "Strange Beasts of China" has arrived. I can't wait to dive into it!
The writing is variable. The thinnest stories are those that are thinly disguised social satire – speculative builders make houses that really are giant mushrooms, an area of a city really does vanish and so forth. Others explore more imaginative premises, like the mysterious fermented tea that is only drunk by women.
But the last story suddenly reminds you of how good good writing can be. It is a self-contained chapter from Yan Ge's book "Strange Beasts of China". The way she handles a complex plot though its twists and turns, the ability to conjure up the sort of emotions that are hard to name precisely, and, above all, the way she draws you instantly into the story – the writing towers over the remainder of the anthology. Most of the other stories are interesting glimpses of contemporary China. Yan Ge's contribution is quite simply great writing.
My copy of "Strange Beasts of China" has arrived. I can't wait to dive into it!
August 8, 2025
Back in 2020, this was the first of Two Line Press's "Calico" series "dedicated to capturing vanguard works of translated literature." (More books in the series here: https://www.catranslation.org/books/?...)
The seven stories (6 authors, 5 translators) in this collection range widely in length and style, but they share offbeat themes that kind of waver between what I might call myth and urban magical realism (a phrase I stole from another review). Overall, a solid group where realism meets fantastical elements with several standouts: "Sour Meat," "The Mushroom Houses Proliferated in District M," and "A Counterfeit Life."
This was selected as part of a translated literature book discussion group at my local library. Here are some of the upcoming reads planned: https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1G1E...
(If you're on Facebook, a like and/or follow for the Friends of the Bladensburg Library page would be most appreciated, especially since I help run that page.)
The seven stories (6 authors, 5 translators) in this collection range widely in length and style, but they share offbeat themes that kind of waver between what I might call myth and urban magical realism (a phrase I stole from another review). Overall, a solid group where realism meets fantastical elements with several standouts: "Sour Meat," "The Mushroom Houses Proliferated in District M," and "A Counterfeit Life."
This was selected as part of a translated literature book discussion group at my local library. Here are some of the upcoming reads planned: https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1G1E...
(If you're on Facebook, a like and/or follow for the Friends of the Bladensburg Library page would be most appreciated, especially since I help run that page.)
Read
August 20, 2022A few thoughts:
This is listed as sci-fi but there is a lot going on in these stories. Some are more like fantsy, some more magical realism.
There are also occasional tastes of horror.
I love that I live at a time when this type of writing is accessible to someone like me. Especially since these stories aren't really "for" me. I don't think so, anyway. I'm assuming the intended audience is other Chinese people living in China, or at least have a strong connection to the language and culture.
So there is a layer of weirdness that is deeper than the fact that they're sci-fi stories. "Weirdness" might not be quite right. But there are assumptions, associations, and frames of reference that I just don't get. And I kinda like that. I like there are elements that allude to themes that go right by me.
But even with the stuff I'm missing there is enough for me to connect with and enjoy.
This is listed as sci-fi but there is a lot going on in these stories. Some are more like fantsy, some more magical realism.
There are also occasional tastes of horror.
I love that I live at a time when this type of writing is accessible to someone like me. Especially since these stories aren't really "for" me. I don't think so, anyway. I'm assuming the intended audience is other Chinese people living in China, or at least have a strong connection to the language and culture.
So there is a layer of weirdness that is deeper than the fact that they're sci-fi stories. "Weirdness" might not be quite right. But there are assumptions, associations, and frames of reference that I just don't get. And I kinda like that. I like there are elements that allude to themes that go right by me.
But even with the stuff I'm missing there is enough for me to connect with and enjoy.
December 4, 2020
A mixed bag is always the case with short story anthologies. All were well written to varying degrees and initially I thought it was just the speculative elements that made me less inclined to like a story. However, one of my favorites, Flourishing Beasts was probably the most magical so that theory doesn’t work. My other favorite was The Counterfeit Life which had a plausible idea to it and was one of the longer ones which usually work better for me yet Lip Service in its exploration of a TV anchor feeling her looks and thus her job fall away from her irritated me and I’m still not entirely sure why. Anthologies appeal to me because you can be introduced to so many new authors at once but inevitably you have to take the good and the bad for that convenience.
June 23, 2020
Pleasantly mind-altering, troubling. I read these each day before bed. I liked each story, it was like eating through a box of candies you've never heard of. Nice blend for a short story collection, you can feel that it comes together into one but at the same time the stories are very different. I was impressed with the humor and subtlety coming through the translations. There are a few that have haunted me for days afterwards, though I've enjoyed the haunting. They have lead me to interesting thoughts and moods. Very nice collection.
June 17, 2021
This collection of stories range from haunting to melancholy. I really liked the jab at society and living a "normal" life in "A Counterfeit Life", and I especially enjoyed "Flourishing Beasts" which really changes your perspective on how things are *really* like with the retreat of the narrator's view.
August 12, 2024
"It was like all these people had no idea who or what they were waiting for and didn't really care who eventually showed up. Perhaps "who" wasn't that important to the people waiting, as long as they got someone. And perhaps the expectations of the people waiting weren't that crucial in the eyes of the people waited for."
July 14, 2022
This book is part insanity, part mind teaser. My favorite story by far was definitely the last one and while a few of them still don’t quite make sense to me, I’m glad I stumbled across this book in my library and took a chance on it.
April 11, 2020
These stories were a pleasure to read. Reading scifi, I tend to get numb to the finer joys that can come out of other genres. This was all very delicate and strange and enjoyable to read.
July 21, 2020
I found this book to be very interesting consists of my foreign language that I speak myself.
July 27, 2020
(3.5/5)
January 15, 2021
Really, really weird and interesting short stories. Not very difficult to follow, which feels abnormal for some reason.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 38 reviews