In a mining town steeped in vice, an ambitious newspaper editor is shot dead on the street, and almost everyone in the community seems to have an interest in his death, even his colleagues and his ice-cold wife. In this passage from the Chinese translation of Dashiell Hammett's seminal Red Harvest, Hammett's hard-boiled detective confronts the grieving father of the murdered man... entirely in mandarin.

Trying to get past competence towards real fluency? One of the things we recommend to more advanced students is worrying less about reading Chinese literature and more about just exposing yourself to whatever fiction will keep you turning the page. And if you like detective fiction we think you'll enjoy this selection. We won't spoil the ending, but if you like the story you can pick up the whole book for less than 15 RMB on Amazon China. And if you can't for some reason send us an email and we'll figure out how to buy it for you.
 said on
February 3, 2013
I had a Hammett craving earlier this winter and was excited to find this translation on the cheap. Tough to capture in Chinese, though; to me, Hammett reads as hyper-idiomatic, even for noir.
 said on
March 4, 2013
Why are there no audiobooks in Chinese? ? I have a number of Chinese friends who also are desiring this. New market to break open for you guys?

Thanks for this and everything!
 said on
March 5, 2013
There are! I found numerous 有声书 apps for the iPad, have been listening to excellent free audiobooks.

鲁迅,巴金,张爱玲,钱钟书, 老舍; it's all out there, also lots of contemporary, lighter material.

Good luck.
 said on
March 6, 2013
@zgidwitz and other Popup listeners

you can make a good start at http://www.tingbook.com/

I haven't yet found a source where you can read along with the voice though.
 said on
April 15, 2013
@laubis baidu search should turn up the text versions of most if not all of these http://www.tingbook.com/book/4599.html

rumor has it that 沈从文 was a favorite for the noble prize shortly before he died in '88...
 said on
June 12, 2013
我在一个生产化工公司工作的,最近又我们的一位销售员在台湾出差了几天,他在那儿买了一本小说送给了我:“哈比人”。我太高兴收到了这本书!可惜是在台湾买的,都是繁体来的呀!美关系我慢慢地读。。。好慢慢地读,至少用我iPad的一个应用程序叫做Pleco- 又好用手写又好翻繁体字!那。。。最后只要揣好把他的工作位置抢下的一个办法。。。。
 said on
October 10, 2013
 said on
October 10, 2013
What does 'linse' mean, both fourth tone? Its translated as stint, do you mean stingy? Its the part where the grandfather is describing his daughter in law.
 said on
October 10, 2013
Hi MAC.JAMIE,

吝啬(lin4se4)means stingy which is a fancy way of saying "小气" or in oral Chinese"抠门儿(kou1men2er5)". "吝啬" is more commonly used in written Chinese. Hope it helps out :-)

- Grace
 said on
April 30, 2015
I would be interested to buy the whole book . But , I need an annotated version of the same then only I can read it comfortable....I m at learning stage for Chinese....waiting your earliest reply........regards...

Ajay

ajay_parijat@yahoo.co.in
 said on
April 30, 2015
@Ajay,

Annotating the whole book online would be a challenge. First because of the copyright issues, and then because it is actually quite long.

What we aim for is interesting passages that have a good tone and represent the difficulty of the story. This way if readers can get through the passage, you can buy or order the book with confidence.

If this is still above your level of comfort, I'd suggest just keeping going with the other texts/stories on the site. Once you've gotten through most of them, you should be comfortable reading a book like this since you'll know most of the vocabulary except for the story-specific words, which usually repeat enough that you can pick them up in context anyway.

Best,

--david