Nine Continents

A Memoir In and Out of China

Guo’s novels have been reviewed by the New York Times Book Review, New Yorker, Independent (UK), Guardian (UK), San Francisco Chronicle, Entertainment Weekly, and Los Angeles Times, among others. We anticipate that we will get strong review attention for her memoir.

Nine Continents was published in January by Chatto & Windus in the UK (under the title Once Upon a Time in the East). It was serialized prominently in The Guardian (link), and is getting good review attention in the UK, which will propel our US publication in the fall.

Xiaolu Guo is one of the most acclaimed Chinese writers of her generation. She was named one of Granta’s Best of Young British Novelists and her work has been nominated for numerous awards, including the Bailey’s Women’s Prize for Fiction, the Man Asian Literary Prize, and the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.

I Am China (Doubleday, 2014), Guo’s most recent novel, was longlisted for the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction and was an NPR Best Book of the Year.

Readers will be captivated by Guo’s story, which straddles East and West: she describes the hardship, drive, and curiosity that led her to Beijing to study film and eventually to immigrate to the West. Nine Continents also documents the experience of China in the eighties and nineties, how the Cultural Revolution continued to affect family life, and how the country’s economic ambitions gave rise to great change.

The book is also a moving testament to the birth of a creative spirit, as Guo recounts her growth as a writer and filmmaker.

Guo was in part inspired to write Nine Continents by the birth of her first child, as she began reflecting back on her own life and imagining the future her daughter will have.

Guo has also directed several award-winning films including She, A Chinese and a documentary about London, Late at Night.

Guo is a charismatic, articulate promoter of her work; we plan to bring her to the US.