Hon Lai Chu and Jacqueline Leung on Mending Bodies with Jane Wong
On tour from Hong Kong, author Hon Lai Chu and translator Jacqueline Leung visit Seattle to celebrate the English translation of Mending Bodies, out April 29 from Two Lines Press.
For readers of Ling Ma and Sayaka Murata, Hon Lai Chuâs dystopian exploration of body autonomy, relationships, and late capitalism defies and then reassembles dark realities.
In a failing city, a government program incentivizes couples to âconjoinââsurgically attach themselves to one anotherâpromising a flourishing economy, ecological revitalization, and personal fulfillment. A student writing her dissertation on the programâs history begins to suffer from insomnia. As her world unravels and under the weight of expectations by both society and her close friends, she worries that maybe they are all right when they tell her it would be betterâfor the good of another person and for the good of the countryâto sacrifice everything that she is and get conjoined. Mending Bodies blends body horror and political allegory to explore a world where even the motives of those you love most are shaped by larger forces.
The House bar will be open to serve alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages.Jacqueline Leung
Jacqueline Leung is a writer and translator from Hong Kong. Her work has appeared in Wasafiri, Transtext(e)s Transcultures, Gulf Coast, Asymptote, Nashville Review, SAND Journal, the Asian Review of Books, Books From Taiwan, and elsewhere. She is a translator editor at The Offing. Her excerpt of Mending Bodies is a winner of PEN Presents by the English PEN.
Hon Lai Chu
Hon Lai Chu is one of Hong Kong's most prominent writers and the author of several novels, including Mending Bodies, Degravitation Zone, and A Dictionary of Two Cities, co-authored with Dorothy Tse, which won the Hong Kong Book Prize. Her most recent works are Half-Eclipse and Darkness under the Sun, two diaristic essay collections about Hong Kong. She has also received accolades from Taiwan's Unitas Literary Association, the Liang Shiu-chiu Literature Award, the Dream of the Red Chamber Award, and the Hong Kong Biennial Awards for Chinese Literature, among many others.
Jane Wong
Jane Wong is the author of the memoir Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City (Tin House, 2023), winner of the Washington State book award. She also wrote two poetry collections: How to Not Be Afraid of Everything (Alice James, 2021) and Overpour (Action Books, 2016). She is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize and fellowships and residencies from the U.S. Fulbright Program, Harvard's Woodberry Poetry Room, Artist Trust, Hedgebrook, Ucross, Loghaven, the Barbara Deming Memorial Fund, and others. An interdisciplinary artist as well, she has exhibited her poetry installations and performances at the Frye Art Museum, Richmond Art Gallery, and the Asian Art Museum. She grew up in a take-out restaurant on the Jersey shore and is an Associate Professor at Western Washington University.
