CHINA
Country Overview:
“Love the food, hate the government”
I arrived in China in May 2013 and left August 2020. I taught English for awhile, did my master’s of politics & foreign policy at Tsinghua University, worked for a year at China Today, and then two years at Xinhua News Agency. I spent most of my time in Beijing, but also traveled to Shanghai, Wuhan, Inner Mongolia, Shenzhen, Panjin, Guangzhou, Tianjin, Qingdao, Xi’an, Sanya, Macau, Taiwan, and Hong Kong.
Books I Read in 2019
Since I work in news and a lot of the writing I do is non-fiction, all the books I read this year were fiction. I thoroughly enjoyed reading all of them and yes, I read 3 Murakami books this year and loved them all. Will definitely be reading more of his work in 2020. I’ve also made a goal to read 20 books next year, 15 fiction and 5 non-fiction. I’ve written a review for all of these books which can be found here. Any recommendations for both genres are welcome!
*Most disappointing book I read this year was The Plague. Was expecting something more exciting given the premise, but didn’t enjoy it as much as I thought I would
** Toughest book to read was Kafka’s collection of short stories
Fatherland - Robert Harris
The Chrysalids - John Wyndham
Empire of Dragons - Valerio Massimo Manfredi
South of the Border, West of the Sun - Haruki Murakami
Dune - Frank Herbert
The Outsider - Albert Camus
Norwegian Wood - Haruki Murakami
Dune Messiah - Frank Herbert
One Day In The Life Of Ivan Denisovich - Alexander Solzhenitsyn
The Gilt Kid - James Curtis
The Sound Of Waves - Yukio Mishima
Money: A Suicide Note - Martin Amis
Slaughterhouse-Five - Kurt Vonnegut
Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? - Philip K. Dick
Rendezvous With Rama - Arthur C. Clarke
The Plague - Albert Camus
The Dog Stars - Peter Heller
Anthem - Ayn Rand
The Metamorphosis & Other Short Stories - Franz Kafka
1Q84 - Haruki Murakami