Ryu Zhong's Blog - Posts Tagged "journey-to-the-west"

‘The most fascinating element about this book for me is the style of writing. The writer has a smooth and unique style. It’s artistic but not complicated. It’s a special book away from modern life and its hustle. It has this ancient eastern theme and takes you to a very different place.’‌‌
— Hager Salem, Online Book Club

Recently, we released the second volume of ‘Takuan’s Adventures,’ which goes by the title ‘Hunters of Weredemons.’ In the book, it becomes apparent that ‘The Adventures’ have lots in common with one of the four classic Chinese novels. ‘Journey to the West’ is the title of that novel, and to the modern reader, it’s known as ‘Son Wukong, the Monkey King’ or simply ‘Monkey.’‌‌

The similarities (and differences) between ‘Takuan’s Adventures’ and ‘Journey to the West’ are no coincidence, and I’ll tell you why.

When I was working on the sci-fi novel series ‘Demons Within,’ its world needed a story. A history even. This often happens with fictional worlds: just having a set of random facts isn’t enough, not only for the author and readers but also for the characters themselves.

Every thinking person, sooner or later, thinks about the past: about their own as well as about the days gone by. What will my heroes look back on? Where will they get knowledge about the past of their world?

Historical Novel, History Textbook, or a Fairy Tale?
I didn’t want to write historical treatises and dictionary encyclopedias. Reading those isn’t the most exciting thing to do either. Especially for the younger heroes of ‘Demons Within.’ So, I decided to give the story a more entertaining form.

The dominant culture of the ‘Demons’ world arose from a fusion of Asian traditions: Indian, Chinese, and Japanese. In their past, these traditions faced the same challenge that I did – to preserve the history of the world, they needed a medium that could be easily and happily passed down through the ages. This medium is an epic novel.

Indian ‘Ramayana’ and ‘Mahabharata’; Japanese ‘Kojiki’ and ‘Kujiki,’ ‘Nihongi’ and ‘Kaidans’; Chinese classic novels ‘Journey to the West,’ ‘Romance of Three Kingdoms,’ ‘Water Margin,’ and ‘Dream of the Red Chamber’ — here are perhaps the most famous of them. There’s plenty to choose from!

I chose with no hesitation: most of all, stories I love to read (and write!) about tricksters, cunning and foolish at the same time. Sun Wukong from ‘Journey to the West’ is just that: he fools both gods and demons, but he falls for their tricks as well. ‘Journey’ takes place both in the mortal world and in the Heavens, and by following this canon, I’ll have enough space for all the necessary details for the world building.

If you want to know more about the style ‘Takuan’s Adventures’ are written in, you must listen to the story in my personal blog.