Sad and Joy Entertainment City

Author: Meng Meng
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-03-01
Features: Vivid writing, depicting the distortion of human nature. A cultural figure from Guanzhong, Shaanxi, portrays various noble and evil works amidst social transformation. On a vast temporal and spatial coordinate, he calmly examines the lives of several families, revealing the complex and ever-changing contradictions in people's minds under the temptation of money and beauty. Here, humans and ghosts dance together, staging heart-wrenching and earth-shattering love, family, and bizarre stories. Money and beauty exclude the law; sin and conspiracy make morality invisible to the light. Yet, the banner of humanistic spirit never falls, saving not only the law and morality but also the soul. Yin Xiaokuan and Feiximeng raised 900,000 yuan for building an entertainment city, which led to a dispute and a four-year lawsuit. Later, they successfully retrieved the funds through a mysterious phone call, and the lawsuit was ultimately dropped. Four years of litigation were wasted! This was not only a waste of emotions and life but also a tragedy of the law. What Yin Xiaokuan found even harder to accept was that this entertainment city lawsuit, which had caused him immense suffering and led to the deaths of several people, was masterminded by his former lover Jingjing, her lover (and the lover of her mother), the entertainment city manager, and the new lover of the court president. Humiliation and hatred twisted human nature. He resolved to take revenge with his life, but a fire made him suddenly realize that he would ultimately share his fate with Jingjing in the flames. The real arsonist was Jingjing's half-brother with one arm and mutism—"The One-Armed Mute." There are cases within cases, emotions within emotions, shrouded in mystery and moving the heart. The novel recreates the social life of the early days of China's reform and opening up, revealing the complex and ever-changing contradictions in people's minds under the temptation of money and beauty. Here, humans and ghosts dance together, staging bloody tragedies and directing heart-wrenching, earth-shattering love, family, and deformed love stories. Here, money and beauty exclude the law; sin and conspiracy make morality invisible to the light. Yet, the banner of humanistic spirit never falls, saving not only the law and morality but also the soul of sin. The rebirth of the protagonist Yin Xiaokuan in the flames, the judgment and decision of the One-Armed Mute, Feiximeng's "practice of giving birth to a son," as well as the efforts of Nan Caiping, Flower Auntie, Jiao Jiao, Shasha, and the wife of the mayor to expose the truth behind the ghost city lawsuit and the arson case, all shine with the light of human nature and morality.