Expatriates' rich contribution to China recognized

In the nine years since they met, Bob Bellows, an 84-year-old jazz singer and Deng Peitong, a 14-year-old visually impaired pianist have been performing together, bringing their love of jazz to Chinese audiences.

Left-behind, but not forgotten

There are an estimated 61 million children in China living without one or both of their parents. A book of letters, diary entries and pictures by these young people has proved a sensation, and revealed the rich inner-lives of some of the country's most vulnerable people. Sun Yuanqing reports from Anlong, Guizhou province.

Stranger gives fiction

A Chinese proverb says that one can only read a book earnestly when it is borrowed. A booklover in Shanghai is attempting to encourage reading by lending his books freely to strangers on the subway.

Drama runs in her writing

The Swan is the most painful novel Xu Xiaobin has ever written. But like her other books, it is filled with magical romanticism. Mei Jia finds out what inspires the first Lu Xun Literature Prize winner.

Q+A: Xu Xiaobin

Getting to know the writer in her own words

Major works by Xu Xiaobin

The Pisces

Boonie Bears gains ground

Although there has been some controversy surrounding popular animation series Boonie Bears, its book version, published by Sichuan Children's Publishing House, is becoming a publishing sensation at home while attracting attention at overseas book markets.

They don't make things like they used to

There is a Broadway tune titled Everything Old is New Again which could summarize the many ways vintage objects get "a new lease on life". With a retail concept not yet experienced in Asia and rarely seen in the West, seasoned retailer and successful fashion e-tailer Adrienne Ma is breathing a second life into collectibles. Think 1950s-Louis Vuitton cases turned mahjong set holders or iPod docks, Goyard suitcases becoming dressing tables or portable whiskey bars (hanging against a wall, no less) or rock crystal from a 1930s chandelier that formerly hung in the palace of an Italian nobleman now dangling as a glamorous handbag hook.

IN BRIEF (Page 22)

In small-town China, movies are big

The boom in China's film market has been quietly shifting from the metropolises to slightly smaller cities - smaller by Chinese standards - with a growing impact on both domestic and imported films and their financial performances.

What's new

Aboriginal star

A gathering of gourmets

There are invitations to dinner, and there are invitations to dinner. When one is invited to dine in Beijing with members of the Chaine des Rotisseurs, the oldest international gastronomic society, it's hard not to lick one's lips in anticipation.