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Trends and Buzz
Beijing Bestsellers: Religion, History, and Bow-Tie TsangPosted by Joel Martinsen, July 2, 2005 8:48 AM
![]() Cover of the new Donald Tsang biography There is little change in the makeup of the overall list of bestsellers this week. The joint history text stays at the top for the third week in a row. And as two of Lu Qin's three childhood education guides drop off (see last week's column), several books return to the list: Dan Brown with Angels and Demons, heart-throb author Guo Jingming with 1995-2005 Not Yet Summer Solstice (#9), and Jack Welch with Winning (#10). On the general non-fiction list, a biography of Hong Kong's Donald Tsang is this week's new entry (at #7), knocking out Jolin Tsai's English Diary Book. Subtitled "From Salesman to Chief Executive of the SAR", the bio's a rush-job put out by Unity Press to take advantage of Tsang's recent elevation. The other biography on the list is Lawrence Kuhn's The Man Who Changed China (#2), the authorized portrait of Jiang Zemin. This book sells well in pirated editions, too; will Donald have the same draw? Two of the entries are religious in nature. Li Shutong Talks About Buddhism collects the wisdom of Buddhist Master Hongyi, who died in 1942. And the public's recent fascination with Zen anecdotes and their application to business and life continues with Read Zen, Learn How to Live. This is something of a counterpart to the collection of classical anecdotes Small Stories, Great Truths that currently inhabits the list of overall bestsellers. Readers are also drawn to historical anecdotes. Extraordinary Paths, subtitled "Stories from China, 1840-1999," emulates the storytelling style of the ancient classic, New Account of Tales of the World, which collects anecdotes about notable figures during the Jin Dynasty. The new book tells stories about Chinese heroes during the last century-and-a-half, from Zeng Guofan, to Sun Yat-sen, to Qian Zhongshu. The Chinese title comes from the first line of the Daodejing: "extraodinary paths" can also be interpreted as "not the eternal way." Another collection of historical stories is Gold Letters on a Crimson Field, a memoir about growing up in Beijing in the 60s and 70s. According to The Beijing News, it is not selling nearly as well in other parts of the country. The general non-fiction list for the week of 6/25--7/1:
The overall bestseller list for the week of 6/25--7/1:
Bestseller rankings are taken from the Friday Book Review section in The Beijing News, which compiles its data from the city's major online and brick & mortar bookstores. Links and Sources
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