Wilderness

I have been writing and publishing novels since 2000, so it has been 18 years. Over the past 18 years, he has written millions of words and compiled many editions of the novel. To compile this collection, I looked back at the words I had written over the past 18 years, and found that I had inadvertently written the history of my soul. Therefore, this collection was selected according to the changes of time. There are a total of 18 short stories in the "Story of Smoke Village" series, 8 of which are selected here. What I write about in this series is mostly my childhood rural memories, those people struggling to make a living in the pure natural scenery. Some commentators believe that my novels continue the tradition of lyrical novels by Shen Congwen and Wang Zengqi. In this group of novels, I write more about farmers who endure hardships and live in poverty. I have no intention of singing an elegy of rustic innocence. If the reader is willing, it is not difficult to read the huge sorrow behind "Green Clothes". "Floating Bell Bottoms in 1983" is about my teenager and my teenage brother. Compared with "The Story of Yancun" which looks at life from a child's perspective, the boy in "Bell-bottomed Pants in 1983" has a half-understood understanding of life. He has witnessed the tragedy of his teenage brother's fate - the process of idealism being shattered by real life. Looking back at this novel, I still burst into tears when I read that the young brother cut off his bell-bottoms to use as diapers for him. The child who looked up to his brother back then is now in his fifties and still fighting against life to protect the idealism in his heart. Now, my heart is filled with desolation and coldness. Life is oppressive, but I no longer have the courage to stand up. The narrator of "Boy's Journey" has grown from the twelve-year-old child in "Bell-Bottoms Floating in 1983" to the age of his teenage brother. He is now eighteen years old and is also facing the same problems that his teenage brother once had. I have ideals in my heart, but I am stuck in the countryside. He is struggling hard to get rid of the future written by fate. This novel is written about the process of struggle. He didn't know what he wanted, but he knew exactly what he didn't want. So, at the end of "Youth Journey", he left the countryside and headed for the city of his dreams. He came to "Guanwai" in Shenzhen. This was something he had never expected when he was young. He tried his best and was unable to enter from outside the pass. Pass, here, is the actual reference of Nantou Pass in Shenzhen, and undoubtedly it is also a symbol. He fled the countryside and dreamed of entering the "Guan Nei", but he was unable to enter. This period of life is a true record of his youth life. "Root-seeking Group" is written about his middle age. When he fled the countryside and wandered outside the Shenzhen customs, he began to look back at his hometown and returned to the village he had fled as a successful person. He wanted to find his roots, but his hometown was left to them, only to be disappointed and escaped again. He spent forty years living as a lost soul in urban and rural areas. He is not a farmer, but he cannot accept the city like a serious city dweller. It's him, of course, it's me. It is the history of my life and the history of my soul. The process of selecting and compiling this collection of novels relives how a sensitive, young and innocent heart can turn into a tough old soul under the temper of life. I would like to show this process to my readers. I also borrowed this book to pay tribute to my old soul.