旅美华裔作家李翊云，1991年冬入学北京大学，为北大生物系学生。于96年前往美国求学，98年开始以英文写作。距今已九载，期间荣获多项荣誉，包括Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award和Whiting Writers Award。书中作者的几篇经典短故事都已发表于各书刊(Paris Review，New Yorker和Glimmer Train)。作者善于利用短故事来刻画一种在国际化趋势下社会的演进而产生的矛盾。把故事的背景和文脉设置在庞大且复杂的空间与时间轴上，用小人物的形象，心理变化和遭遇来暗示生活在社会过渡期里的一种尴尬和不安。

Daily Mail

'These mesmerising stories present a glimpse of modern China more

nuanced than any reporter could ever hop to gleam.'

Melanie McGrath, Evening Standard

'a wonderfully well-written, fascinating and affecting collection

of stories.'

The Observer

'Li's moving, engrossing stories are particular in their

place...but universal in their themes and their relevance.'

Impac News

'If you have ever wondered what life is like in modern China...you

should read this book...'

Sunday Times

'Readers should pray that Yiyun’s memorable collection is the first of many.' --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Synopsis

Brilliant and original, A Thousand Years of Good Prayers introduces a remarkable first collection of stories about China from an author set to become a major literary talent. In this extraordinary first collection, Yiyun Li brings us a modern China facing up to a complex history of repression and guilt. In Immortality, winner of the Paris Review prize, a young man bears a striking resemblance to the dictator, and so finds a strange kind of calling. In Extra, first published in the New Yorker, a Chinese woman, alone in middle age, befriends a young boy who has become an outcast in a remote country school. In their friendship, we see how love can begin to overcome the strictures that dominate their lives. In turn horrifying and breathtakingly lyrical, Yiyun Li, a new and talented young Chinese writer, confronts the silence that dominated the history of her country, and illuminates how mythology, politics, history and culture intersect with personality. She leaves us with an enduring vision of a country undergoing tremendous change.