Born in Sanming, China, Ling grew up in Utah, Nebraska, and Kansas. She holds an MFA from Cornell University, where she also taught. Currently, she serve as an assistant professor at her alma mater, University of Chicago.
Candace Chen, a millennial drone self-sequestered in a Manhattan office tower, is devoted to routine. With the recent passing of her Chinese immigrant parents, she’s had her fill of uncertainty. She’s content just to carry on: She goes to work, troubleshoots the teen-targeted Gemstone Bible, watches movies in a Greenpoint basement with her boyfriend.
So Candace barely notices when a plague of biblical proportions sweeps New York. Then Shen Fever spreads. Families flee. Companies cease operations. The subways screech to a halt. Her bosses enlist her as part of a dwindling skeleton crew with a big end-date payoff. Soon entirely alone, still unfevered, she photographs the eerie, abandoned city as the anonymous blogger NY Ghost.
Candace won’t be able to make it on her own forever, though. Enter a group of survivors, led by the power-hungry IT tech Bob. They’re traveling to a place called the Facility, where, Bob promises, they will have everything they need to start society anew. But Candace is carrying a secret she knows Bob will exploit. Should she escape from her rescuers?
A send-up and takedown of the rituals, routines, and missed opportunities of contemporary life, Ling Ma’s Severance is a moving family story, a quirky coming-of-adulthood tale, and a hilarious, deadpan satire. Most important, it’s a heartfelt tribute to the connections that drive us to do more than survive.
發表於2024-11-27
Severance 2024 pdf epub mobi 電子書 下載
圖書標籤: 小說 美國 科幻 英文原版 末日 華裔作傢 女性 移民
風趣幽默,節奏也蠻舒服;對末世的想象力實際上還蠻匱乏的,但是也是這樣纔讓人驚醒,我們在日常生活裏消費主義主導下的種種麻木錶現,和末日喪屍比起來又高明在哪裏
評分讀之前對內容一無所知,剛開篇就提到瞭N95口罩,一次性手套,瘟疫,我呼吸都加速瞭。作者以SARS為原型,虛構瞭一場源起深圳叫做Shen fever的全球性瘟疫。故事主人公生活在紐約,目睹著紐約因瘟疫流行而從繁華到廢棄,想想現在的紐約簡直是疫情震中,一種不寒而栗的感覺。小說中的兩個故事,都讓我對摩西齣埃及有瞭進一步的認識,其一是“我”的父母於1988年抵達美國,因次年發生在國內的事件而決定留在美國;其二是“我”從一個被獨裁的幸存者小團體中逃齣。作者齣生在福州,幼年隨父母移民美國。作者的寫作很棒,結構好,遣詞造句好,場景構建好。我忍不住想,如果作者沒有移民美國,她現在會是一個很好的作傢嗎?前兩天,作者憑這本小說得瞭一個奬,有五萬刀奬金,18年齣版的小說似乎因為疫情再次獲得關注。由衷恭喜她!
評分Eerie reading in 2020. Compelling narrative structure weaving pre- and post-apocalypse timelines, figuring out what happened at the End, plus an escape story. A nuanced critique of capitalism & consumerism from a second-gen persepctive (mom's yearning for work v millennial ennui), a parallel story of severance from the homeland and need to belong
評分挺好看的僵屍文學,真正的敵人不是病菌,而是capitalism、consummerism、corporate culture三大件。#沒有爛尾!
評分末世病毒的侵襲 不如看到過於熟悉的坐標下城市衰敗崩塌心悸 果然是生活化的場景最有衝擊力 - To live in a city is to take part in and to propagate its impossible systems. To wake up. To go to work in the morning. It is also to take pleasure in those systems because, otherwise, who could repeat the same routines, year in, year out?
Severance 2024 pdf epub mobi 電子書 下載