The classic bestselling Chinese novel spanning four decades following the creation of the People's Republic in 1949, translated into English for the first time.

Zhang Wei was born in 1956 in China's northern province of Shandong. He graduated from the Chinese Department at Yantai Normal College in 1980. Three years later, he became a member of the Chinese Writers Association, an organization for which he has served as the Vice-Chairman of the Shandong branch. His first novel, The Ancient Ship, was a bestseller and award-winner in China. One of the most widely respected fiction writers of the post-Mao era, Zhang Wei lives in Beijing.