"From Ma Jian comes a satirical novel about the absurdities and cruelties of life in a post-Tiananmen China." "Two men, one a writer of political propaganda and the other a professional blood donor, meet for dinner each week. Over the course of one drunken evening, the writer recounts the stories he would create, had he the courage: a young man buys an old kiln from an art school, opens a private crematorium, and is overwhelmed by demand; a heartbroken actress performs a public suicide by stepping into the jaws of a wild tiger, watched nonchalantly by her ex-lover; an illegal migrant scrapes together a living by writing love letters for the illiterate but can't help falling in love himself. Extraordinary characters inspire the writer, their lives pulled and pummeled by fate and politics as if they were balls of dough in the hands of an all-powerful noodle maker." Ma Jian allows us a humorous yet profound glimpse of those struggling to survive under a system that dictates their every move.