Description: Fang Fang's explosive short novel inspired widespread social debate in China upon its publication in 2001. In exploring the difficulties of one woman shackled by patriarchal tradition against the backdrop of radical social change, The Running Flame bears witness to widespread experiences of gendered violence and inequality.
Review Quotes: This novel by one of China's most famous and incisive authors is a heartfelt but unflinching look into the lives of village women in the postsocialist People's Republic. It excavates the tangled emotions connecting money, marriage, and violence and reveals the machinery of gender as experienced by the rural poor. At the heart of the book, its own motivating fire, is a desire for more and better choices for China's young women.--Nick Admussen, author of Recite and Refuse: Contemporary Chinese Prose Poetry