“One of my challenging, but very interesting responsibilities is to present the forthcoming titles in the Seagull Books catalog at semi-annual sales conferences.
‘The Chinese like to say they’ll eat anything on four legs except a table. Mo Yan’s POW! makes a good case for that. What he did for alcohol in The Republic of Wine (booze nearly killed him one night) he does here for meat—its sometimes ghoulish production, its gluttonous consumption, and its obsessive social role. And meat is the prism through which contemporary China and many of its contentious issues are viewed. By turns accusatory, comical, and fantastic, this latest riveting novel by one of China’s most popular writers, a frequent nominee for the Nobel Prize (Oe Kenzaburo “picked” him for the prize years ago), will further embellish his international reputation.’
POW! will release in mid-November. Sometimes I love my job.”—George Carroll, independent publishers’ rep