Jiangshan

Jiangshan is a long historical novel by the writer Mo Wu. Originally titled Jiangshan Meise, it was first serialized on Qidian.com; the simplified-Chinese print edition has been issued volume by volume by Yunnan People's Publishing House since 2009, and this book is the first volume of the series, First Entry into the Imperial Capital. The protagonist is a modern horse trainer whose soul, through an accident, travels back to the late Sui dynasty and takes possession of the body of a young bandit named Xiao Buyi. To survive and protect himself in a time of chaos, Xiao Buyi relies on a modern man's business sense and horsemanship to run a horse business, and together with several brothers sets out beyond the frontier to buy horses. He had meant only to remain an outsider, but his extraordinary origins doom him to an extraordinary life: from the frontier to the Central Plains, from horse thief to newly risen court favorite, he is drawn step by step into the chess game of the rival warlords contending for power at the end of the Sui. The novel blends martial-arts adventure and suspense into a real historical framework. Emperor Yang of Sui, Yuwen Huaji, the Curly-Bearded Hero, Li Jing, the Red Brush Maiden, Zhang Xutuo, Li Mi, Li Shimin, and other figures appear in succession, and palace intrigue and tales of the martial world unfold in interlocking fashion; the Daoist master Taiping subplot and the large and small foreshadowings planted in the book echo back and forth, forming a sweeping panorama of the Sui–Tang transition. In preparing the print edition, the author revised the online text substantially. The series comprises six volumes in all.