Wa By Mo Yan 2.0

A "story about China's one-child policy", this novel is more of a family tapestry centered around the narrator's aunt, a character loosely based on Mo Yan's own aunt. A worker in a rural health clinic, the aunt is first renowned as a miraculously skilled midwife, but later, as she is required to enforce China's new family planning laws, she is reviled and demonized, bearing the brunt of rural society's resentment of interference it its ancient ways.

Told in the form of four letters and a play, Frog is a departure from Mo Yan's previous florid prose style in its simplicity and directness.

Our new Nobel laureate! As of October 11, 2012, Mo Yan is the first Chinese author living inside China without French citizenship and accepted by the Chinese government to win the Nobel prize for literature.

Mo Yan, more than any other Chinese author, is well represented in foreign languages around the world. And with good reason – he is one of the great novelistic masters of modern Chinese literature, with a long list of ambitious novels to his name. His writing is powerful, visual, and broad, dipping into history, fantasy and absurdity to tell stories of China and its people – many have seen the influence of Gabriel García Márquez in his writing. Originally counted a part of the "root-seeking" literary movement of the 80s, it quckly became clear that Mo Yan had a style and voice all his own. He is often regarded as the Chinese writer with the most potential to appeal to an international audience.