The Eagle Cat and the Music Box Girl

"Now, what you need is a place to have an affair."

Books.com.tw - United Literature's Writer of the Month

This is the first novel by Xie Xiaohong, the author of "So Dark."

"This is Xie Xiaohong's shot that hits the history of Hong Kong for the past decade..." - Yan Shuxia



A university professor in his fifties is caught in a passionate extramarital affair with a doll.

He unleashed upon her everything he loved in the real world, but which was forbidden, even considered evil and depraved, everything he could never desire...


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On horseback, Professor Q and Alice were both naked. The professor imagined himself embracing Alice like a prince in a fairy tale—not the sanitized fairy tales written for children, but the folk tales, full of desire and passion. "See? The moonlight and the night are galloping," the professor said, pointing to a picture and pressing it against Alice's earlobe. "Next time, we can change to a scene of snow, grassland, or even, if you like, hell." - "The Owl-Headed Cat and the Music Box Girl"



As human beings, we all have unspeakable desires, pains, and secrets. But in this world, is there a place, a person, or even another species, who is willing to accept all of us without judgment, selflessness, and tolerance?



Hsieh Hsiu-hung, winner of numerous literary awards, has a limited output, but "The Falcon and the Music Box Girl" is her first novel after a long absence. Hsieh Hsiu-hung masterfully condenses words into a unique vision and sensory experience, engraved before your eyes and gently touching your skin. It evokes a touch of fantasy and dream, yet entwines with the thorny, intricate, and painful reality of Hong Kong.



At the end of the novel, reality and fantasy intertwine, dreams and reality blend together. As the novel states, "Everyone here is you, even if all of you are not you." Xie Xiaohong deeply questions the human predicament and fall. When the sorrow and anger from past lives come rushing back, when the present is so overwhelming that it leaves one almost breathless, when there is no escape from the absurd yet powerful constraints from another, as a person, where should we go?


Owlish, the English translation of "Owlcat and the Boombox Girl" (translated by Natascha Bruce), received the following awards:
．National Book Critics Circle (NBCC) Gregg Barrios Book in Translation Prize Finalist
．Words Without Borders Best Book of 2023 (USA)
Times Literary Supplement Books of the Year 2023
．Big Issue Books of the Year 2023 (UK)
．Long listed for the Warwick Prize for Women in Translation


Features of this book



◎Hsieh Xiaohong, winner of numerous literary awards, writes his first novel since his short story collection "So Dark."



Xie Xiaohong said that this book is dedicated to Hong Kong over the past decade. ... In "The Eagle-Headed Cat and the Music Box Girl," those place names and events are born out of reality: Mogendi, the Vanguard Party, the Vanguard Republic, Port Viagra... As long as you know a little about Hong Kong, you can easily grasp their real-life metaphors without any doubts - as if a piece of frosted glass, both blurry and extremely clear, is inserted between the text of the novel and reality; it allows people to identify: that is the "scene" of "Hong Kong." That is "this moment," "what is happening." - Yan Shuxia, excerpted from the recommended preface "Nothing Happened Today"



Yan Shuxia wrote the preface. Recommendations are heartfelt by David Wang (Professor of East Asian and Comparative Literature at Harvard University), Xi Xi (author and poet; winner of the Newman Chinese Literature Award and the Swedish Cicada Prize), Robert Ho (author and poet), Chia-Hsien Yang (author), Wai-Tong Liao (poet), Zishu Li (author), Yi-Jun Luo (novelist), Li-Ching Han (author), and Yu-Chia Luo (poet) (listed in alphabetical order by surname).



...The story of Owl Cat and Alice has long been in my heart. For me, the novel was already finished, yet it's been hanging there, with nowhere to land. The situation in Hong Kong is constantly changing, and so is the story, as if this city is the deeper destiny of Owl Cat and Alice. --Xie Xiaohong, excerpted from the afterword, "Never Forget."

2020-07-03

寶瓶文化

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