Elsewhere: 'Wonderful writing' Sarah Hall

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As always, I appreciate the opportunity afforded me to have an early read by netgalley.com and Scribner Books. The opinions in this review are expressly those of ButIDigressBookClub and are intended for use by my followers and friends when choosing their next book. #butidigress #butidigressbookclub #elsewhere #netgalley #scribnerbooks @scribnerbooks One recurring theme in the book is the exploration of the relationship between language and understanding. In the first story, we meet Pigeon, a young fiction writer who falls in with a group of drunken poets. They tell her that understanding poetry is not necessary; it’s about the experience and emotion it evokes. This theme of the power of language and its ability to transcend understanding is woven throughout the stories in “Elsewhere.” 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. In fact comedy goes deeper than that for Ge. “I really aspired to be a stand-up [comedian]! I did an event with [the comedian] Maeve Higgins in Cork last year and I said I really want to be a stand-up, and she was like, ‘Why?’ That night I washed my face for the first time since the twelfth and slept in Vertical’s tent. There was moaning coming, off and on, from different directions. Someone sang until the small hours. Eventually, I slept like a dead person and did not dream of anything.

As a result of this cosmopolitanism, the stories in Elsewhere are jangly and eclectic, set in wildly different time periods and filled with dissonances. That shit-and-literature theme recurs, in various incarnations, throughout. Elsewhere’s characters seem constantly in abdominal discomfort; someone vomits in five of the nine stories. The act of eating meat takes on a horrifying resonance, in part because characters in two separate stories are presented with dishes made from human flesh. I think comedy is about tension – about building up tension, then releasing it or not releasing it. A recommended read if you are into something that is stimulating, provocative, intriguing and “meaty” (no pun intended, but you would understand especially if you would have read the last story in this compilation 😅). Yep.” Small Bamboo nodded. “This prawn could have been sitting in an office in the central government now if he hadn’t got the wrong girlfriend and joined the protest with her at the wrong time.” Yan Ge explores human connections and disruptions in this ethereal collection…Yan combines dry and subtle humor with her evocative lyrical style. These stories brim with intelligence.” —Publisher’s WeeklyStrange Beasts of China feels like a riddle and a parable and a dream, the kind of book you want to get lost in.” This would be a thought-provoking read between gore, quirky and creative activity. I am still in the midst of digesting and I think the book deserves a revisit in the future. Second time might give me different perspectives and understanding. Yan Ge was born Dai Yuexing in 1984 in Sichuan, China. She began publishing in 1994. She completed a PhD in comparative literature at Sichuan University and is the Chair of the China Young Writers Association. Her writing uses a lot of Sichuanese, rather than Standard Chinese (Mandarin). People’s Literature (Renmin Wenxue 人民文学) magazine recently chose her–in a list reminiscent of The New Yorker’s ‘20 under 40’ – as one of China’s twenty future literary masters. In 2012 she was chosen as Best New Writer by the prestigious Chinese Literature Media Prize (华语文学传媒大奖 最佳新人奖). We walked to the Little House. The buses hadn’t been running since the twelfth and there were no taxis. Small Bamboo had smoked three cigarettes by the time he finally remembered to offer me one. I told him I didn’t smoke.

A gripping, stunning work, worldly and otherworldly. Rich with philosophical depths, comedy, feeling and playfulness, Elsewhere is a wondrous book of books. It is like new light in an old, searching world.” —Madeleine Thein, author of Do Not Say We Have Nothing My favourite is the story is “How I Fell in Love with the Well-Documented Life of Alex Whelan” which is a fun ride for me and my second favourite is “Free Wandering” where it is close to a magical realism experimental piece that surprises me at the end.Through the eyes of protagonist Li Jiaqi, readers are transported to the fictional town of Shuanglang, where they witness the impact of social and economic transformations on ordinary lives. Ge’s vivid descriptions of the picturesque landscapes of Yunnan Province bring the setting to life, immersing readers in a world that straddles the boundaries of time and place. In The Little House, our characters are dealing with the fallout of a massive earthquake, still dealing with the reverberations, unsettled, questioning what's a dream and what's real with a reference to Zhuangzi's Butterfly Dream.