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To Read or Not to Read, That is My Questions
by Jimmy Liao
Less and less people are visiting the bookstore down the street. The bookstore owner doesn’t want to give up the store, so he has his child gather all of their friends used to hang around the bookstore to discuss whether they want to read and buy books at the store anymore. Thus begins a battle of words over reading or not reading, a debate spanning past and present. The adults talk in clichés, and the kids go on flights of fancy. To read or not to read? Indeed, that is the question.
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Picture booksThe Rainbow of Time
by Jimmy Liao
Special mention for the BolognaRagazzi Award 2020 in the Special Category dedicated to Cinema “Papa, why are you crying?” “It’s nothing. It’s just that the ending of this film is so moving.” When she very little, the girl lost her mother. Whenever the girl cried for Mama, her Papa would say: “Let’s go see a movie!” He’d say: “After all, Mama used to love to watch movies, so maybe one day we’ll run into her at the cinema.” The girl always fantasized that one day she would come across her mother at the movie theater, and she always projected her own life into the dramas being played out up on the silver screen.... One day she met a boy who liked the movies as much as she did. The two would go to the cinema after school and passionately discuss the film on the way home. Not long after, the boy emigrated overseas with his whole family, and they lost contact. But they had promised each other that one day they would meet again in the cinema. After graduating from school, whenever she felt exhausted from work, she would escape to the cinema to enter the quiet, secluded world of a film. She met him in a movie theater, and he worked in the film world. He told her ideas about the many films he wanted to make, and she told him about the many films she wanted to see. Their love was like the kind depicted in films, where the lovers would form a small household together. But like some films, life can be unpredictable. One day, they parted at the door to the cinema. It would be the last time that she would ever see him. But she discovered that she wouldn’t have to go the movies alone—because she had a young life growing inside her belly....
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True storiesOn Children
by Wu Xiaole
Adapted by the Taiwan Public Television Service (PTS) into one of 2018's most critically acclaimed TV shows about school life, On Children was picked up for distribution by Netflix, became Japan's top-watched Netflix show for a period in 2018, and went on to win 5 Golden Bell Awards in 2019. A young tutor shows how social pressure warps not just the way we educate our children, but how we love them. What is the fundamental purpose of education? Is love truly unconditional? As a home tutor for seven years, author Wu Xiaole was allowed inside the homes of many different families, witnessing peculiar and even shocking scenes behind closed doors. A caring mother, upon seeing her son’s test scores, slaps him across the face with full force. A boy who can’t bear the thought of upsetting his parents attempts to hide his sexual orientation, deceiving others and hurting himself in the process. Some parents strictly control the lives of their children as though they are holding a remote control; other parents use money as a tool to appease and manipulate their children. Wu thought of herself as merely a tutor with one simple goal — to teach her students. She never imagined that tutoring would directly expose her to deep conflicts between students and their families. In this collection of true stories, Wu faithfully recounts these painful moments. This book is not a dogmatic tirade about how children should be educated, but rather offers provocative testimonies about her real experiences. These stories were written in the hope of helping us reflect on what matters most — and to think long and hard about what it means to bring a child into this world.
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FictionGhost Tricks
by Chiatse Hsu
If there’s no clear justice in our world, can we rely on justice from another world? “Hey, I’m just as scientific as those CSI folks! It’s just that happen to be haunted by the victims as well…” –Police Officer Good old-fashioned police work + Mystical forces of the supernatural = A compelling page-turner combining the best of the whodunit and the ghost story. The wife of the president of a well-known finance firm is found dead at home, and security cameras show that the victim was pulled off her bed by an unseen force, and killed by multiple blows to the head. Rumors swirl in the neighborhood about the apartment being haunted, and even TV talk shows are talking about the “ghost killer.” Ah-che, the police detective in charge of the case, drags his colleague and best friend Ma into the investigation. Ma is a skilled detective and a lover of logic puzzles. He decides to take on the case and do everything he can to find the truth, because he doesn’t believe that a ghost did it—not because of his devotion to scientific investigation methods, but because he knows that a ghost would never go to all this trouble just to kill someone. Plus, what Ma never told anyone is that he can see ghosts—and the victim’s spirit has already visited him… An inversion of the typical detective novel, Ghost Tricks starts with a traditional scientific investigation before having its protagonist interact with another world, where the secrets and troubles of supernatural forces are revealed. The novel’s initial skepticism toward the ghostly transforms into an uncovering of what goes on behind unexplainable phenomena, creating the perfect blend of the detective novel and thee ghost story. The writing is action-packed and brings the reader into a multitude of scenes and settings, recalling the vividness of a film. The plotting is tight, humorous, and suspenseful, rivalling the best action-comedies out of Hollywood.
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FictionShanghai Junior
A Story in China 1929
by Evan Huang
The year is 1929. The Republic of China in its 18th year of existence has just established its capital in Nanjing, but large swaths of the nation are still ruled by warlords and foreign powers still maintain their own strongholds. It’s a time of excitement, transformation, and chaos. In Shanghai, the financial and cultural hub of the Republic, “modern” young women and men in Western-style clothes head to movie theaters, dance halls, and coffee shops amidst the rapid development, and the new trends ripple across the nation. Beyond the splendor, however, a dark side exists: tensions between the Chinese administrators and their foreign counterparts threaten to boil over, criminal gangs compete for control of the still-thriving opium trade, and those seduced by the phantoms of money and power sometimes pay the ultimate price. This is the landscape in which Shanghai Junior takes place. Angelina Fan is coming to terms with the murder of her loving father, the latest casualty of the opium trade. The police commissioner, faced with the challenge of solving a high-profile murder in the French Concession district, calls in brave young bounty hunter Tony Shine. Brought together by fate, Angelina and Tony find themselves immersed in the adventure of a lifetime…and in mortal danger. Combining exquisite illustrations, historical details of a fascinating time and place, a suspenseful murder mystery, and a coming-of-age love story, author and illustrator Evan Huang brings us a thrilling new graphic novel.
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Children's & YANo. 39 Animal Surgery
by Chinlun Lee
No. 39 Animal Surgery is set in Chinlun's husband's veterinary surgery, with many details taken from real life events. Chunlun has disguised herself in the narrative as the surgery's pet cat who can understand the conversations between the animals and record them on paper. Filled with the most adorable characters, such as the dog seeking refuge and another who lost its owner in the market, the sneezing and coughing cat, the stubborn rabbit who hates to chew but needs its teeth cut and the dizzy butterfly, this is a charming story of one vet's loving care for all the animals that come through the doors of his No. 39 Animal Surgery.
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Children's & YAThe Disobedient Stone
by Ahn Zhe
In Gagabe Forest, even a gentle breeze has to be careful passing through. The forest is home to creatures so set in their ways, you couldn’t imagine. Sensitive and old-fashioned, they live lives where everything stays the same. Nothing is allowed to change, because they believe that even the smallest change could bring disaster to Gagabe Forest. This means: the number of trees in the forest must stay the same, and at the same heights; everyone has to take the same road home every day; everyone has to keep the same hair… They would accept nothing new, nothing adventurous. They live according to tradition. Their lives are as flat and predictable as a glass of plain water. To make sure that everything in the forest stays the same, a neighborhood watch called Team Six patrols the entire forest every day to check that everything is the same as yesterday. This is where our story begins. A stone appears in the forest, and no one knows why. Sometimes it glows, sometimes it makes strange sounds. Team Six is stumped. How could they restore Gagabe Forest back to the way it was …?
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FictionThe Man Who Stoops in Palm Line Canyons
Inca Pan’s Shot Stories
by Inca Pan
What would it be like living in the contamination zone after a nuclear attack? Would you buy a kaleidoscope that allows you to see the future and make the right decisions? Would it be a blessing or a curse to live with the love of your life in a virtual reality graveyard? When Memory, Desire and Fear walks down toward you on a city street, should you walk with confidence or drop on all fours as you face the crossroads of destiny? Illustrator and master storyteller Inca Pan has created a collection of modern fables, combining words and pictures based on real-life experiences. His subjects include changes to the environment, his views on current events, fantasies of the future or the apocalypse, and the tiniest details of daily life. The twelve stories are highly allegorical and coupled with stunning images that will deeply move the reader.
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FictionYellow Peril
by WANG Lixiong
Raging floods and a food crisis caused by overpopulation lead China to sign a controversial international economic cooperation agreement. The signing triggers political infighting and the eventual assassination of the Party secretary. The prosperous coastal regions take the opportunity to declare independence, leading to a civil war. Taiwan supports the southern rebel government in a bid for self-preservation, while Beijing orders a nuclear strike on Taipei. Taiwan’s forces take China’s nuclear bases, but the bomb that was intended for use in a revenge strike falls into foreign hands. Fearing random nuclear attacks from China, the UN led by the US and Russia initiate a series of surgical nuclear strikes that annihilate China’s nuclear capabilities. Yet this leads to a total collapse of China’s troubled society. A farsighted crisis management expert trains civilians in secret, helping people escape from the wasteland that was China. Hungry Chinese migrate through Siberia, Europe, and the Americas, creating a wave of refugees that proves impossible to stop. While seeking asylum and assistance, they also work to develop faster-growing food as they attempt to survive in the post-disaster world. China's dictators leverage distrust across the world into a large-scale international nuclear war. Half of the earth is covered in a thick layer of nuclear fallout, and a nuclear winter begins. With no crops growing, the world descends into famine and fear. What kind of future is in store for our self-destructive species?
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FictionTHE CEREMONY
by Wang Lixiong
In Tiananmen Square, twenty-eight days before the ceremony commemorating the Party’s anniversary, a bee changed China and the world. The more tightly monitored the society, the stronger the backlash. The smallest crack can break the biggest dam. The newest political thriller from Wang Lixiong, the author of Yellow Peril. The Party is busy with preparations for its anniversary celebration and the World’s Fair, expecting the two events to be emblems of the Party’s achievements. Every Party bureaucrat from the chairman on down is focusing on making these two events even better. One member of the National Security Committee, looking to advance his career, raises the warning level of a flu epidemic. On the top levels of the party, epidemic prevention efforts are being leveraged to bring down political opponents. These machinations result in the intervention of the World Health Organization, whose investigation eventually shows that no unusual mutations of the influenza virus are present. Director Su of the National Security Committee Office seems to have been a hero throughout the effort, but in truth he has become a common target for all sides. Even the Chairman has started to distance himself from him. Director Su knows that he will become a scapegoat after the celebrations. Backed into a corner, he decides to leverage high-tech internet monitoring technology orchestrate to assassinations of the Party’s top brass, helping him get out of his difficult situation and come back stronger than ever… There are no ambitious antiheroes in The Ceremony, no conspiracies, no mutinies, no sign that everything is about to come crashing down. One bureaucrat trying to save himself, one policeman out on the border, and one politically unaware engineer is all it takes to bring down an immense authoritarian machine. As the power of dictatorships grow ever-reliant on new technology, the dictators are less and less capable of either understanding the technology or using it directly. They can only rely on the professionals and delegation to their inferiors. The people who on the intersection between technology and the authoritarian apparatus find themselves wielding outsize power. No one knows who they are, and yet they can bring the political system down to its knees. With modern technology, authoritarians today can do what authoritarians in the past could not; resistance fighters in the past could do what resistance fighters today cannot. The Ceremony begins with China as it is today, extrapolating to a world when dictatorship has grown so overreaching, and the opposition so weak, that authoritarianism seems never-ending and impervious to change. And yet the rulers of The Ceremony are fragile: just a few people, acting in their own self-interest, can easily bring it down. A empire that seems solid and unshakable can crumble under a single well-calculated blow.
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Humanities & Social SciencesForbidden Memory
Tibet During the Cultural Revolution
by text by Woeser, Photos by Tsering Dorje
Forty Years of Prohibited Recollections from the Cultural Revolution in Tibet through the Camera Lens. The author Woeser spent six years interviewing and holding discussions with some 70 elderly citizens to dig even deeper into the historical background and living memories and grief depicted by the almost 300 precious images contained in this book.
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Picture booksWay Back Home
by TENG Yu
Selected by the Illustrators Exhibition of Bologna Children’s Book Fair in 2017 One person, one dog, one bicycle. One road, one trip, one journey home. The emotional richness of home is impossible to convey in words. The word home evokes different images for everyone. Some people can’t wait to return home; others can’t wait to leave. And more broadly, the city we grow up in is also our home. Fresh off a win at the 4th GCIA awards, TENG Yu paints a finely detailed portrait of the Taipei she grew up in through a journey back home starring a man and a dog. She depicts the din of buses and scooters on the streets, and the Metro and YouBike systems that have become such a big part of daily life. The characters walk by the riverside and the bridges, sample tasty snacks, experience the crowded din of traditional markets, and take in the historic atmosphere of Japanese-era buildings and sites. Under TENG’s pen, these experiences become elegant and simple images with a warm touch. Whether you’re from Taipei or elsewhere, the people, trees, cars, and rivers that you see as you follow the characters on their journey can remind you of your own way home as well. A slim but enchanting volume perfect as a gift or for your own collection.
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Biography & True StoriesEtudes for Papa
by Sean Chuang
Dedicated to all fathers, a graphic novel composed with warmth and love for my son. Fatherhood is one of the quintessential human experiences. Sean CHUANG used to wonder, what goes through a father’s mind in the first years? What challenges and hardships does he face? Then CHUANG found himself raising a child of his own, and these questions were being answered. In the middle of the chaos, he began reliving his own childhood, and his thoughts turned to his own father. Perhaps it is the eternal sameness of experiences like fatherhood that connect us across the generations. A rookie dad is just like a child. CHUANG hopes this record of those first years with his son will be helpful to the reader who is father to a young child, or soon to be, and that any reader will find in it something of interest and value.
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The Little Drifter
by Crystal Kung
Winner of the 2017 Taiwan Golden Comic Awards for Best New Talent The little drifter wanders among various cities, making his appearance in the valley of swirling colorful flags, in a misty ancient city, in the middle of a big city of various kinds of people, in a settlement with a mysterious lake in the mountains, in a metropolis in the rain with skyscrapers, and in a city full of old alleys and bars. He is like a star, guiding the direction for all travelers who get lost. This book is a self-projection of the author Crystal Kung, who believes home is where your heart is.
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Children's & YALook and Find. Barcelona's Museums
by Robert García
1 city, 11 museums, and more than 150 objects to find! Hours of fun for all ages on an amazing visit to the most outstanding museums in Barcelona. From Museu Blau to CosmoCaixa, going through Museu del Disseny, Museu Egipci, La Casa dels Entremesos, MACBA, Museu Marítim, Fundació Joan Miró, Museu de la Música, Fundació Antoni Tàpies or Museu de la Xocolata. Illustrated by Robert Garcia, Gaur Estudio.
