Bao Huo Lie Zhong Novel - (Spring 2006 Issue)

Author: Han Zhongliang
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-04-01
Features: This book collects six works by five writers—Ding Bogang's The Road Beyond, Wang Song's Moonlight Flowing Through Time, Xu Yan's Hidden Illness, Jin Changguo's News from Our Station, Xu Kaiheng's A Garden for One, and Zhao Yunliang's Singing Ballads to the Sky. It emphasizes originality, quality, and uniqueness, presenting a collection of middle-length stories that celebrates the theme of love, pursues a sense of the times, and blends readability, interest, and artistry. I have little time to consider. At noon, Jin didn't come back for lunch, and he didn't come back in the evening either. I only remembered that Jin hadn't come back for lunch in the evening after realizing he hadn't come back for lunch at noon. A gust of wind blew in from the side of the valley, spinning me around abruptly. I wondered where Jin had gone—whether he had gotten into a fight with someone outside, been in an accident, or if, in truth, he had gone on a long journey with someone, to some coastal place to work and never come back. I waited for Jin all night and then waited for another whole morning, until it was time for lunch again the next day, when I saw him riding a bicycle back. Jin pressed himself tightly onto the handlebars, hunching his neck and bowing his back, his rear end sticking far out, like a giant mantis slowly appearing from the other end of the highway. A little closer, I even heard Jin pursing his lips and blowing a whistle intermittently. Before his death, I couldn't stand the way Jin crouched on the bicycle like a mantis, whistling, calling it a "dead pig look." Now, I don't think that way anymore. Jin could hunch his neck, bow his back, and stick his rear far out, crouching on the bicycle like a mantis and whistling, showing that he was in a good mood at this moment, satisfied with his current life, satisfied with the place of Putuan, and not thinking of leaving anytime soon. Jin parked the bicycle in front of the riverbank and brought a basin of water to wash the wheels and axles. Jin wipes his car every time he goes out and again when he comes home. I'm sure Jin won't be going out today. I sighed in relief and turned along the stone path by the river to check on Wenjun again. Wenjun's front door was locked. Wenjun and his wife, Zhang Xiaohua, were undoubtedly hiding in some corner, working hard. Wenjun and his wife, Zhang Xiaohua, were like oxen, horses, or camels—knowing nothing but relentless labor. They carded cotton, fired bricks, wove bamboo baskets and mats, raised pigs and silkworms, and of course, farmed the land. When they had nothing else to do, they would follow each other one after the other into the mountains tens of miles away, chop two loads of firewood, carry it to Changpu Town, and sell it for three or five yuan, which could also be counted as income. Wenjun and his wife, Zhang Xiaohua, toiled like ghosts. At over forty, their backs were bent, their legs crooked, their hands trembling all year round, and their noses streaming with snot, yet they were completely unaware. However, Wenjun's mood was also very good. Although Chaji had left, Yutang had left, and my ungrateful son Sanliu had also left, dragging the family to Anhui, only Wenjun and his family remained as outsiders in Putuan, along with the lone Jin, and my little fat head. But Wenjun's mood was still very good. Wenjun had Wenjun's determination, and Wenjun had Wenjun's plans. Wenjun's plan was that he had two good children. Wenjun's eldest daughter was working as a laborer in the county tea factory, and his son was studying in the provincial capital. Wenjun had paid a high price to buy his eldest daughter a, spending three thousand the first time and another three thousand when she entered the tea factory. Six thousand yuan had turned his eldest daughter into a county resident, into someone with a job—something no one else could have done, but I believe only Wenjun could. The eldest daughter was working in the county, and after marrying and settling down, she would naturally stay in the county. The second child, after finishing school, would undoubtedly be assigned to some big city outside. Wenjun's second child in