Zhou Daxin – författare

China is ageing. Its shrinking households, overworked and overstretched, struggle to carry the burden of care for their elderly. Retired Beijing judge Uncle Xiao is one among millions of old-timers who face a hopeless choice: accept a lonely decline, or chase dubious 'miracle cures'. Then into his life steps Miss Zhong, a young rural nurse with her own share of problems. The two have little in common, but as time delivers tragedies they learn that family can take many forms. Will this unlikely pair weather life's storms together, and will Xiao find warmth in his sunset years?

China is ageing. Its shrinking households, overworked and overstretched, struggle to carry the burden of care for their elderly. Retired Beijing judge Uncle Xiao is one among millions of old-timers who face a hopeless choice: accept a lonely decline, or chase dubious ‘miracle cures’.Then into his life steps Miss Zhong, a young rural nurse with her own share of problems. The two have little in common, but as time delivers tragedies they learn that family can take many forms. Will this unlikely pair weather life’s storms together, and will Xiao find warmth in his sunset years?

An ailing mother forces Nuannuan to abandon her cherished metropolitan life and return to Chu Wang. Once there, she finds her birthplace fragmented and forgotten by modernity. Despite warnings, she quickly reconnects with Kaitian, a childhood sweetheart.The village is centred around Red Lake, whose misty shores once provided solace to ancient kings and their entourages. The couple unearth forgotten treasures left behind from this royal past and are quick to capitalise, setting off a boom in tourism.Word of the lake’s beauty spreads, attracting rampant outsider investment and infecting the sleepy village with dark tastes and unsettling appetites. Drunk on power, the newly elected mayor quickly starts to reshape Chu Wang to his own corrupt ends. Determined to share in this new abundance, will the villagers swap one type of poverty for another?

At the age of 66, Ouyang Wantong, the former governor of Qinghe province, was too young to die. He touched the lives of so many people during his time on Earth. Some of them loved him intimately, while many more held him in the highest esteem. But there were also those who hated him and wished him dead. And now the battle to find his rightful place in the history books has begun…After the Finale is a fictional biography of an extraordinary man who grew up in poverty in China's Mao-era and then rose through the ranks of government during the country's period of reform and opening up. It's a tale of love, leadership, betrayal, corruption, lust, greed and the nature of power amid the rise of the 21st century's new superpower.