So...
This book was really as weird as the title makes it sound. It's set in China in the 70s, when the reform of Mao Tse-Dong sent hundreds (thousands, depending on which history book you read) of young men into the wilderness of the Mongolian hills for "re-education." It is the story of one such young re-educated man (the author- it's supposed to be a true story) and all that happened to him there.
So what happened to him there was that he and his friend saw a couple movies once. I would tell you his friend's name, but I can't. This was an audio book, and therefore I have no idea how to spell his name... can't even guess. See, my first mistake here was picking up a book that said "translated from the French by..." on the cover. In my experience, translated by anyone from anything, unless it has the historical significance of Mein Kampf, is not worth the effort of wading through the cultural differences and language barrier sure to be in the book. And this was a Chinese guy who wrote in French and it was translated to English. Yikes. Not gonna be fun.
Anyway, there was this guy (author) and his friend (dude), and before they were sent to the hills to be re-educated they had seen movies. They entertained all the villagers and whatnot by dramatically recounting stories from the movies. Propaganda movies, yes, but made interesting by the two boys. So everybody loves them, and this little daughter of a tailor (the little seamstress, we NEVER learn her name, Author spends the entire book referring to her as The Little Seamstress- ANNOYING), just thinks these boys are amazing. Of course she falls in love with Author's friend, Dude. Dude and TLS sneak out to be together quite often, blah blah blah.
Well, Author and Dude get a hold of a book by Balzac. Having been subjected only to propaganda-inspired literature until this moment (they're about 18 or so), they are enraptured by the story within. Dude uses the bawdy story to seduce TLS, and they have a marvelous tryst beneath a ginkgo tree, the leaves of which (covered in blood from the quite literal de-flowering) he brings back to Author for a souvenir. What a good friend. Dude and TLS continue to do it with abandon whilst Author and Dude try to scrounge up more illegal books to satisfy their lust for literature. For some reason, Author is always along with DUde and TLS while they're hanging out... he just disappears politely while they're all nakie and stuff. What a good friend.
Dude gets a quick vacation and goes back to visit his family. TLS comes to Author, sad because she's pregnant. Author takes her somewhere for a secret abortion so no one ever finds out. Dude comes back. Author and TLS never tell him. And... book ends.
Really? Done? Yes. No, I did not miss a CD at the end of this one- I heard the end credits. This was a classic case of let-my-guard-down-and-picked-a-bad-audio-book, coupled with sadist-desire-to-find-out-if-it-ever-gets-good. It didn't.
Two things struck me. I couldn't figure out why Author was writing this story and not Dude. I mean, nothing ever happened to Author! This was stupid! All he did was follow his horny friends around and kind of wish he had a girl too. I guess it's his story because this initial exposure to literature led him to an eventual (quite unknown) career in writing. Meh. Not worth it.
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