Yan Ge (Chinese: 颜歌; born 1984) is the pen name of Chinese writer Dai Yuexing (戴月行).
Yan Ge was born Dai Yuexing in 1984 in Sichuan, China. She began publishing in 1994. She completed a PhD in comparative literature at Sichuan University and is the Chair of the China Young Writers Association. Her writing uses a lot of Sichuanese, rather than Standard Chinese (Mandarin).[1] People’s Literature (Renmin Wenxue 人民文学) magazine recently chose her – in a list reminiscent of The New Yorker's ‘20 under 40’ – as one of China's twenty future literary masters. In 2012 she was chosen as Best New Writer by the prestigious Chinese Literature Media Prize (华语文学传媒大奖 最佳新人奖).
Some bright spots but overall a deeply frustrating read. The author was quite young when she wrote this, and it showed. Teenage 小心思 was depicted well, but the adult emotions seemed contrived, veering towards overwrought melodrama. Also the massive tone disconnect between chapters kept jerking me out of the story (Nguyễn Nhật Ánh bildungsroman vs noir snippets of everyday people dying violent deaths). I'm still interested in checking out Yan Ge's latter works though.
so glad there are 3 more books set in pingle zhen, this place is so haunting and captivating and has such bad vibes. loved this ode to misfits and outcasts and those that are left over and left behind