Fracture

Name: Fracture
ISBN: 9787559626820

孙频Dec 2018

3.9

Word count: 151K words
Chapters: 8
ISBN: 9787559626820

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Summary

A post-80s writer championed by such renowned authors as Yan Lianke and Su Tong. Sun Pin has published widely in journals including Harvest, People's Literature, and Flower City since she began writing fiction. She has published several literary works, won the Zhao Shuli Literary Award, and has repeatedly been named an outstanding young novelist by magazines such as Fiction Monthly and Literature and Criticism. This is a collection of six novellas that continues the style of Pain and Salt, but Crack possesses something new: a light called hope bursting forth from despair—still painful, yet this new kind of pain is strangely exhilarating. As the book says, "There is a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in."

Editor's review

Sun Pin's novellas have long been known for their sharpness. Crack continues the gaze on women's fate and grassroots survival found in Pain and Salt, but adds a layer of light beyond the pain. The six novellas stand alone, their characters mostly struggling amid hardship, deprivation, and emotional fractures, yet the author never lets the narrative stop at despair—instead she lets hope seep through the cracks. This "hope tinged with pain" is what most deserves attention here: it offers no cheap comfort and does not deliberately sensationalize suffering, but pushes characters to their limits to see how they find a reason to keep going. Sun Pin's prose is dense, her details solid, her emotional drive powerful; the book suits reading one or two pieces at a stretch in quiet time rather than fragmented dipping. For readers interested in contemporary novellas, women's writing, and grassroots narratives, this book offers an experience that neither shies from sharpness nor abandons warmth.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers who enjoy contemporary novellas and regularly read literary journals
Readers concerned with women's fate and grassroots survival narratives
Readers who can accept painful narratives and hope to see glimmers of light in writing about hardship
Literary enthusiasts who want to understand the creative landscape of the post-80s generation's core writers

Not a good fit for

Readers who prefer light, healing stories with brisk plots
Readers sensitive to intense emotion and depictions of suffering
Readers who only read full-length novels and are unused to standalone novella structures

Reading tips

Read one or two pieces at a time, pausing between them to let the emotions settle before entering the next story.
At moments of characters' hardship, notice how the author plants seeds of hope rather than merely following the plot.
Read alongside Pain and Salt to observe how Sun Pin's writing of pain continues and changes.
Keep a pen handy to mark sentences that unsettle or move you, and revisit your reactions after finishing.

版权信息
自由故
杀生三种
九渡
不速之客
异香
掮客
后记

FAQ

Is this book a novel or a short story collection?

It is a collection of six novellas. Each stands alone with no continuous characters or plot; they can be read separately or straight through in order.

Can I read Crack without having read Pain and Salt?

Yes. The three books share a stylistic continuity, but the pieces in Crack do not depend on the earlier books' plots, so reading it directly poses no obstacle to understanding—though reading them side by side better reveals the author's evolution.

Are the stories all very bleak?

The stories do often begin from hardship and fractures, and the pain is palpable, but the author's focus goes beyond displaying suffering: light shines through despair, so the reading experience is not solely heavy.

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About the author

孙频 Author

Sun Pin is a contemporary Chinese fiction writer whose work focuses on lived experience and the complex terrain of human nature; public information about her remains limited. Nine of her works are included in the collection, spanning novellas and boxed sets. Representative titles include On the Wasteland, The Mermaid at the Center of the Water: Selected Novellas (Harvest Five-Year Collection 2018–2022), Yesterday's Ark, Pain, The Sailor Bound for Australia, Crack, the three-volume "Sun Pin Pain Trilogy" (Pain, Salt, Crack), and The Covenant of the Berrya. These works are often classified as social fiction and classic works, suggesting that her writing starts from concrete situations and, within the novella form, explores her characters' emotions and fates under the pressure of reality in a steady, pain-inflected style. Available materials are insufficient to confirm biographical details; readers may approach her narrative orientation and thematic concerns through the works listed above.