Wuhan
A Documentary Novel
by Liao Yiwu
Narrated by Ernest Reid
This title was previously available on NetGalley and is now archived.
Send NetGalley books directly to your Kindle or Kindle app
1
To read on a Kindle or Kindle app, please add kindle@netgalley.com as an approved email address to receive files in your Amazon account. Click here for step-by-step instructions.
2
Also find your Kindle email address within your Amazon account, and enter it here.
Pub Date Jul 26 2024 | Archive Date Jan 02 2025
Talking about this book? Use #Wuhan #NetGalley. More hashtag tips!
Description
As rumours of a strange new illness in Wuhan spread via social media in China, 25-year-old citizen reporter Kcriss decides to travel to the epicentre of the disaster to try to find out what is really going on. He sees an ad for corpse carriers at a funeral home – Male or female, 16-50 years old, unafraid of ghosts - and decides to apply. He quickly realises that the official death figures bear no relation to what is happening in the local crematoria. But the brief moment when he can tell the truth to his followers on social media is soon over: he is discovered, followed and arrested by the security police – all documented live on the internet.
In this startlingly topical documentary novel, Liao Yiwu takes us into the heart of the crisis that unfolded in Wuhan and unpicks the secrecy and cover-up that surrounded the outbreak of the public health emergency that ravaged the world.
Where did the virus come from and what happened in Wuhan? Protocols are buried and new lies cement the story of the party's heroic victory - propaganda that poisons people like the virus.
©2020, 2022, 2024 Liao Yiwu (P)2024 Post Hypnotic Press Inc.
Advance Praise
"Poet and dissident Liao Yiwu has long been an outspoken critic of the Chinese government. Imprisoned and tortured for a poem on the Tiananmen Square massacre, Liao subsequently fled his homeland. His literary reputation in exile continues to grow with a documentary novel about the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic. Blending fact and fiction, Wuhan tells the story of Kcriss, a citizen reporter who travels to Wuhan when social media rumours of an unexplained outbreak of pneumonia begin to circulate. There, he finds a job in a funeral home, where he bears witness first-hand to the disparity between official figures and the reality on the ground. Wuhan is an episodic novel, weaving close examination with imaginative speculation. With compelling force, it links the unchecked spread of the deadly virus to an older plague: authoritarian propaganda. It’s compulsory reading for anyone who wants to understand the black comic absurdity of the initial response to COVID-19, the courage of Chinese citizens determined to speak for truth, and the tragic price they can pay for it." -The Sydney Morning Herald (Cameron Woodhead and Fiona Capp)
"In Wuhan, Liao chronicles the beginnings of the pandemic in China, which he tracked from Germany. He obsessively downloaded scientific and medical materials, as well as the tide of Chinese social media posts and official and citizen journalism that swamped the internet and, for a few early weeks, seemed to outrun the capacity of Chinese censors to block it.
It is tempting to speculate that Wuhan was written as a documentary novel because the author could not go and report the events he describes. The novel was published in Germany in January 2022 and, as the author explains in an epilogue and several appendices to the English edition, it provoked discussion on the boundaries between fiction and documentary, with its mix of reportage, real and fictional characters.
Wuhan opens with an episode involving a Kcriss Li, a 25-year-old former CCTV news reporter turned citizen journalist. Kcriss Li exists, and the dramatic scene Liao describes was livestreamed and can still be found on YouTube. In it, Kcriss had parked near the Wuhan Institute of Virology, now famous for its research into bat viruses and for the gain-of-function experiments performed there. As he drove away, he was followed—and it quickly became a car chase. He recorded his return home and his terror as the police worked their way through the building looking for him. His online audience commented liberally throughout. Kcriss was eventually detained and forcibly quarantined, briefly reappearing two months later to post a single video which his fans judged to have been recorded under duress.
In Liao’s novel, Kcriss has been inspired by the example of the novelist Milan Kundera, one of the author’s heroes, to give up his safe job with China’s official media in favour of investigating the unfolding events in Wuhan and the origins of the virus, described in an appendix to the novel as the “ultimate taboo”. The main plot is carried by Ai Ding, a fictional historian who tries to return home to Wuhan from Germany to celebrate New Year. Wuhan is locked down and, through Ai’s communications with his wife, we follow the unfolding tragedy, the official lies and cover-up, the desperation and deaths of the citizens, all interspersed with journalistic and official reports. As Ai attempts to make his way across an unrecognisable landscape, a disaster on individual, national and international scales is relived through a dramatic, hybrid narrative." -Prospect Magazine (Isabel Hilton)
Available Editions
| EDITION | Audiobook, Unabridged |
| ISBN | 9781772562477 |
| PRICE | $19.95 (USD) |
| DURATION | 8 Hours, 57 Minutes |
Available on NetGalley
Featured Reviews
Andrea D, Reviewer
Fabulously narrated by Ernest Reid, Wuhan by Liao Yiwu is a haunting and urgent exploration of the early days of the COVID-19 outbreak, told through the lens of Kcriss, a young citizen journalist who defies government narratives to expose the truth.
As whispers of an unusual illness in Wuhan begin to emerge on social media, 25-year-old Kcriss takes the bold step of heading straight to the epicenter to uncover what’s really happening. To gain access, he applies for work as a "corpse carrier" at a funeral home, a position that brings him face-to-face with the grim reality behind the official death toll. The contrast between the government's reported figures and the scenes at overwhelmed crematoria reveals a harrowing cover-up.
However, his moment of truth-telling is fleeting. With every live broadcast to his followers, Kcriss edges closer to danger. His daring documentation catches the attention of the authorities, culminating in his arrest by the security police—an event captured and broadcast to the world before he is silenced.
Liao Yiwu, a dissident poet and critic of the Chinese government, crafts a novel that merges hard facts with creative narrative. Having faced persecution and exile himself, Liao’s writing is steeped in the defiance and courage of those who dare to challenge oppressive systems. This work sheds light on the secretive handling of the pandemic's origins, juxtaposing the spread of the virus with the equally insidious influence of state propaganda.
Blending investigative depth with an evocative narrative, Wuhan lays bare the devastating effects of authoritarian control on public health and freedom of information. It is a searing indictment of the lengths regimes will go to maintain their image, even at the expense of countless lives, making it essential reading for anyone seeking to understand the complex interplay between power, truth, and human suffering. Liao Yiwu’s Wuhan is essential reading for understanding the pandemic’s devastating impact and the cost of silencing dissent. #PostHypnoticPressAudiobooks #liaoyiwu #wuhananovel
Jan T, Reviewer
China, Chinese-culture, Chinese-customs, communism, epidemiology, epidemic, historical, historical-places-events, historical-research, history-and-culture, secrets, cover-up, Covid, lies, propaganda, political-intrigue, politicians, politics, investigative-journalist****
This is a novelized documentary of the dire events in Communist China at the beginning of the epidemic of disease and death as related by a citizen reporter. I have not read anything purporting to be written by any reporters in situ before this, only western slants on what happened and its effects on the world at large. The author (and therefore the reporter) is anticommunist and under government scrutiny. This is not a book I chose to read in one sitting, but in bites so that I could think on the similarities and differences in how the information about the epidemic/pandemic was shared to their own populations. I learned a lot and intend to get my own copy so that I can dig into the info in the PDF.
I can only believe that some of the issues about the speed and smooth transitions in the novel relate to translator Michael M. Day's attempts to reformat Chinese standard presentation into customary western readability.
Narrator Ernest Reid is a credit to his profession.
Wuhan on Audio includes supplementary PDF
I requested and received a temporary digital file from Post Hypnotic Press Audiobooks via NetGalley. Thank you!
#Wuhan by Liao Yiwu Narrated by Ernest Reid Translated by Michael M. Day #NetGalley #DocumentaryNovel #China #PostHypnoticPressAudiobooks #Politics #Epidemic @goodreads @bookbub @librarythingofficial @barnesandnoble @kobobooks @waterstones **** #Review @booksamillion @bookshop_org @bookshop_org_uk #Covid
Readers who liked this book also liked:
Edited by Desiree S. Evans and Saraciea J. Fennell
Horror, Teens & YA
Ernesto Castañeda; Carina Cione
Multicultural Interest, Nonfiction (Adult), Politics & Current Affairs
Karina Sainz Borgo
General Fiction (Adult), Literary Fiction, Multicultural Interest
