Podcast Archives | China Books Review

Murder in Hong Kong with Simon Elegant

The Hong Kong-born novelist and journalist talks us through his new novel "City on Fire," a whodunnit thriller set against the 2019 protests.

Ancient Chinese Politics with Daniel Bell

The Legalists and Confucians still run the show in today’s China, argues a scholar of classical Chinese thought — but the Mohists and Daoists still...

Confucius and Women with Erin Cline

Misogyny and patriarchy are a later misreading of The Analects, argues the author of a new translation of the Confucian classic.

Chinese Comedy with Jesse Appell

The bilingual comedian talks us through the traditional “xiangsheng” form of Chinese comic repartee, and explains whether Beijing can take a joke.

Islamic China with Rian Thum

Islam has been part of China’s religious and cultural fabric for over a millennium, yet often it is seen as a foreign element. The author...

Chinese Horror with Xueting C. Ni

Horror writing has an unsavory reputation in China, but comes with a long history and is full of biting social commentary. The translator of a...

Sex, Scams and Sorcery with Bruce Rusk and Christopher Rea

Tales of trickery were popular in the late Ming dynasty. The translators of a new collection explain how they still resonate today.

Chris Horton on Taiwan’s History and Present

Colonized by the Dutch Republic, Qing China and Japan, Taiwan's complicated past led to a multi-layered identity today. We invited the author of a new...

Timothy Thurston on Tibetan Satire

Tibetans inside China have found various ways to push back against Beijing and voice their dissatisfaction. A lesser-known form of subtle resistance is the art...

China Conspiracy Theories

From Covid as a bioweapon to Chinese soldiers infiltrating America, Alexander Boyd discusses the right-wing conspiracy theories that lead our ranking of bestselling China books.