2016 works worth reading

The Paper Republic website, which promotes contemporary Chinese writing to the English-language world, has just put out its latest list. Now in its fifth year, the list offers readers a wide range of choices. "This year's list is longer than ever, and several books have won international prizes," says Nicky Harman, a UK-based prize-winning literary translator, who prepared the list. At a glance, there are names of writers of fiction, sci-fi writers, online works, poetry and children's literature, all translated and published in English in 2016.

Ruined City

By Jia Pingwa, translated by Howard Goldblatt