Han Shaogong: A Dictionary of Maqiao

The best novel of the year isn’t that DeLillo-on-automatic-pilot thing that broke out, along with SARS, this spring; nor the smutty, anti-Islamic screed by the superannuated French juvenile delinquent; nor even Jane Smiley’s excellent investigation of the unlikely souls of real estate agents. Rather, it is this “dictionary” of the dialect of a fictitious village, [...]