Review Essay

The Life of Saint Xi

China’s official Party press has published a series of oral histories about Xi Jinping’s career, from sent-down youth in Shaanxi to Party Secretary of Shanghai. They read more like hagiography than history.

Ep. 21: Jenna Tang on Taiwan's MeToo Movement

We talked to the translator of a novel that helped launch #MeToo in Taiwan, about why both the movement and the book are having a second wind.

Barbara Demick on the One-Child Policy and International Adoption

The foreign correspondent talks about her new book on child trafficking and the adoption market in China, and the story of twin girls separated at birth.

How China’s Adoption Market Led to Child Trafficking

In 1991 China allowed foreigners to adopt its children, supposedly abandoned by parents because of the one-child policy. But some had been taken or trafficked to feed a growing demand.

What China’s Reading: Uncertain Times

China’s economy is unsteady, its publishing industry facing hard times — yet interesting books continue to come out. Here are five of them, from psychotherapy to mountaineering.

An American Marine In China’s Red Army

In 1937, a U.S. military officer set off with Mao Zedong’s troops to raid Japanese-occupied territory in the north of China. The Communist guerillas, he felt, could be a model for America's military to emulate.

Announcing the 2024 Winners

Presenting the winners (and honorable mentions) for the 2024 Baifang Schell Book Prize, with awards in both nonfiction and translated literature.

Recent books

Chinese Encounters with America

Eds. Deborah Davis, Terrill E. Lautz

May 27, 2025

Columbia University Press

Statelessness after Arendt

Eds. Kolleen Guy, Jay Winter

May 27, 2025

Manchester University Press

China’s Belt and Road Initiative in Africa

Eds. R. Mireille Manga Edimo, Julien Rajaoson

May 27, 2025

Palgrave Macmillan

Those Who Should Be Seized Should Be Seized

John Beck

May 27, 2025

Melville House

Buddhist Masters of Modern China

Ed. Benjamin Brose

May 27, 2025

Shambhala

Browse more recent
Upcoming books

Old Kiln

Jia Pingwa (tr. James Trapp, Olivia Milburn, Christopher Payne)

May 30, 2025

Sinoist

China’s Spies

Nigel West

May 30, 2025

Frontline Books

Translating National Identities Between China and the West

Xinnian Zheng

May 30, 2025

Routledge

Mum Fans

Ye Li

May 30, 2025

Routledge

The Making of China’s Working Class

Marc Blecher

August 29, 2025

Routledge

Browse more upcoming
Bestselling books

Apple in China

Patrick McGee

May 13, 2025

Scribner

Contesting Inequalities

Siyuan Yin

May 13, 2025

Stanford University Press

168 Better Than Takeout Chinese Recipes

Mandy Fu

October 9, 2024

Souped Up Recipes

Never Thought I’d End Up Here

Ann Liang

June 3, 2025

Scholastic Press

Daughters of the Bamboo Grove

Barbara Demick

May 20, 2025

Random House

Browse more bestselling
Editors' picks

Ten Thousand Miles of Clouds and Moons

Xiao Yue Shan

January 29, 2025

Honford Star

Cloud Labour

Sabrina Huang (tr. Lin King)

November 30, 2024

Strangers Press

Sinophagia

Ed./Tr. Xueting Christine Ni

September 24, 2024

Simon & Schuster

Platinum Bible of the Public Toilet

Cui Zi'en

February 6, 2024

Duke University Press

Midnight Stories

Su Tong (tr. Honey Watson)

November 29, 2024

Sinoist

Browse more picks

From the Archive

Dancing in Chains

Squeezed by both political and commercial pressures, China’s book publishers face an existential crisis. How can the industry survive, let alone publish anything interesting?

Ep. 20: Linda Jaivin on the Cultural Revolution

The writer and China watcher talks us through her microhistory of Mao’s last decade in power, and its relevance to Trump’s MAGA movement.

Yan Geling: Crossing the Red Line

The acclaimed novelist and screenwriter built an audience in China for her powerful historical narratives. Then, somewhere, she crossed a line. What is it like to be banned from publishing in your homeland?

Translated Chinese Literature: Short Fiction

Short stories are all the rage in Chinese, but get short shrift in the West. We picked five recent translated collections, from riveting horror tales to irreverent queer fiction.

For All the Trees in China

For over a century, Chinese rulers have launched tree-planting campaigns, to benefit the environment and build the nation. But did their rousing rhetoric actually lead to more forests?

Ann Bridge: Peking Picnic

A 1930s novel of manners with evocative descriptions of Old Beijing offers surprisingly timeless observations about what it means to be an expat in China.

The Race to Type in Chinese

The Chinese typewriter was thought to be an impossible invention. Then they made one. In the computer age, creating a digital input system for Chinese characters proved even more challenging — and changed the way we use language.

Shortlist: 2024 Translated Literature Award

Presenting the jury’s shortlist of five books for the Baifang Schell Book Prize: Award for Outstanding Translated Literature from Chinese Language.

The Nanny’s Tale

A migrant worker leaves her own child behind to survive, becoming a nanny in Beijing. When she hears of a literary community for migrants, she finds her own voice for the first time.

Shortlist: 2024 Nonfiction Book Award

Announcing a shortlist of five books for the Baifang Schell Book Prize: Award for Outstanding Nonfiction Book on China or the Sinophone World.

Life On a Blacklist

A scholar on China reflects on the moment he was denied access to the country — and the compromises others must make to maintain it.

Ep. 19: Steven Schwankert on the Titanic's Chinese Survivors

The author of "The Six" tells us about the Chinese survivors of the Titanic, and how they were met with racist scorn on arrival in America after the disaster.

From the Archive

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