Nowhere to escape

Author: Gong Xiaobing
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-11-01
Features: Who hasn’t gone through the age of sacrificing youth for love? Youth always walks with a mix of innocence and weariness, with no reason at all. After repeated failures, a naive heart slowly hardens into calluses. Without hitting life with a lesson, they learn to give up searching, give up life. A segment of history becomes a novel: Three problem students (Zhang Yang, Du Liang, Zhang Chen)—when Zhang Yang’s girlfriend is sexually harassed by a seemingly virtuous physical education teacher—collaborate with Zhang Chen and Du Liang to stage a student ambush teacher case unprecedented in the city, which shocks the city and eventually lands them behind bars. From a time of innocence, they walk down a path of divergence. After experiencing unrestrained anger, frustration with the harsh reality of society, impulsive actions, restlessness, and numbness follow one after another. All their actions lead to the complete loss of freedom. In panic, they become indifferent, and in prison, they stage one dramatic scene after another. When freedom returns to them, the journey home is long and the world is chaotic. Facing the clashes of reality, he says, "Let’s run away." But the world is vast, yet the space for a heart that wants to escape is small—is it destined to be unavoidable? Or is there no escape? Can leaving the high walls truly mean escaping the world? When there’s a world where one can’t help but be, there’s nowhere to escape the panic. Due to their differing personalities, the three people’s fates end differently, but what remains the same is their realization that when there are many paths, there are actually none to escape from. Confusion, exile, anger, and melancholy not only fill this novel but also permeate the turbulent youth of the author, Gong Xiaobing. This book uses a realistic approach to depict some superficial aspects of life and expands upon them, revealing the unpredictability of change that accompanies everyone’s growth—a change that often runs counter to our expectations.