Year of the Goose (ePub)

As China's economy booms, so does its corporations, but none are as successful as the Bashful Goose Snack Company. Founded by Papa Hui, the company is a national treasure, as is his beloved pet goose who steadfastly remains at his side. Papa Hui's daughter, Kelly, is desperate to prove herself, and jealous of that wretched goose. Kelly heads up the corporate responsibility department where she builds a fat camp for children.

All of the children are killed in a series of gruesome accidents, but the government views the project as a success- the province is no longer the nation's leader in childhood obesity. With all of the nation's obese children cured of their fatness, albeit by death, Kelly returns to the city where hair tycoon Wang Xilai plucks her extensions from Lulu, the woman with the most lustrous hair in China.

When Papa Hui is brutally murdered, chaos ensues. Wang and Kelly are both alternately accused. His goose is left to his own devices, and certainly does not want to remain loyal to a corpse. Lulu flees the tumultuous hair business and becomes the mistress of a politician, who scandalously remains faithful to his wife. Lulu encounters a turtle, who was once a tibetan monk, and eventually escapes to a hipster idyll, an oasis for millionaires where she lives with three witches and learns their ways.

Unbeknownst to Lulu, this model village for tycoons has two new residents. Wang has descended into madness and is holding Kelly Hui hostage in a small shed. In the absurdist satirical tradition of the great contemporary Chinese author Mo Yan, comes a searing and whimsical portrayal of tycoon culture as CEOs run wild in an oligarchical tabloid-driven society, not unlike our very own.