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Title: I Am China

Author: Xiaolu Guo

Narrator: Karen Byrson, Sarah Lam, Andrew Leung

Format: Unabridged

Length: 11 hrs and 46 mins

Language: English

Release date: 04-09-15

Publisher: Random House Audiobooks

Ratings: 3.5 of 5 out of 3 votes

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

In a flat above a noisy North London market, translator Iona Kirkpatrick starts work on a Chinese letter: "Dearest Mu, The sun is piercing, old bastard sky. I am feeling empty and bare. Nothing is in my soul, apart from the image of you. I am writing to you from a place I cannot tell you about yet...."

In a detention centre in Dover, exiled Chinese musician Jian is awaiting an unknown fate. In Beijing his girlfriend, Mu, sends desperate letters to London to track him down, her last memory of them together a roaring rock concert and Jian the king on stage. Until the state police stormed in.

As Iona unravels the story of these Chinese lovers from their first flirtations at Beijing University to Jians march in the Jasmine Revolution, Jian and Mu seem to be travelling further and further away from each other while Iona feels more and more alive. Intoxicated by their romance, Iona sets out to bring them back together, but time seems to be running out....

Members Reviews:

Patience

The first 100 pages or so seem laborious and heavy. Not until the story develops in parallel with the translator, Iona's, sudden love with Jonathan does the novel start to be readable and interesting. There are too many redundant descriptions about the singer's bleak emptiness. Jian's exile and final ending in Greek might be the climax, yet typical of a Chinese outlaw, who spread his political idea in opposition to the authorities. The latter half part of the novel is more impressive than the beginning!

The story is at once painful and inspiring

I did not appreciate the suffering that creative folk in any musical or literary field must endure in

the Peoples Republic of China. The rest of us must be patient. I have no doubt that their efforts

are and will be productive. The story is at once painful and inspiring.

The translator/narrator seemed like an add-on so the book would have a westerner ...

It lacked punch. Neither character ever took off and made you cry or laugh or anything... The translator/narrator seemed like an add-on so the book would have a westerner to bring in a larger audience. Hollywood uses it all the time. A Concise Chinese/English Dictionary of Love is the book to read if you only want to read one of the author's books.

... have been the translator whose character is a very good idea: it gives the room for a western ...

I could have been the translator whose character is a very good idea: it gives the room for a western point of view and it let the space to speak freely. A great read.

A must read!!!

Poignant story with fantastic characterisation - great author - can't wait for her next book.