Photo: Lionel Bonaventure/AFP via Getty Images (2014)
Sample of authors
Qiu Xiaolong
Qiu Xiaolong is a Chinese author, poet, translator and scholar. He was born in Shanghai and grew up in post-revolution China. During the Cultural Revolution, when students were forced into the countryside to "learn from the peasants", Qiu remained in the city as he was often bedridden due to a respiratory problem. With nothing to do during long, tedious days he began to practice tai chi in the...
Literary figures
Harriet Martens
Gender: Female
Not without reason, she is called ‘The Hard Detective’, and Chief Inspector Harriet Martens in Greater Birchester is tough. She needs to be: she has to sort our various problems in her own police force as well as struggling against uncomprehending superiors. But her creator H.R.F. Keating lets her have a happy private life with her husband John – at any rate until their adult twin sons are the vic...