Love this short story collection! Not all the stories were to my taste but there are some gems of Chinese speculative fiction in the book.

Great short story collection with so much though provoking and unique stories! I really want to try to read some more from some of the authors.

This collection covers a wide and fascinating array of contributions to Chinese speculative fiction. I highly recommend that anyone with an interest in scifi or Chinese culture reds this book, you will absolutely get something out of it. I wish I could discover these authors again for the first time. There's several I'm excited to read English translations by. Incredible work!

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for giving me free access to the advanced digital copy of this book.

I love Chinese authors! They're my thing. I loved all these stories and I wish there could be more of them. These fantasy and sci-fi stories have such great ideas that I was mesmerized that someone could think to write something like this! Wow!

A collection that showcases a vast array of stories that blend fantasy and science fiction, complemented by essays that discuss the challenges of translating gender.
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I always find it hard to review short story collections, especially so with an anthology. Some stories were wondrous and some others were lukewarm, despite that I quite enjoyed making my way through the pages.
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(i received an e-arc from the publisher and netgalley in exchange for an honest review.)

i adored this short story collection! not only did it bring me out of a terrible reading slump, it also brought me into fantastical places rendered possible by an alternate China.

In The Way Spring Arrives and other stories, this collection of translated stories are a beautiful diversity of folklore inspired fantasy, science fiction with intriguing ideas, and thought provoking essays. The Way Spring s. Each author’s story and the translator brings beautiful language and ideas that are all tied to the theme of diverse voices and ideas.

I loved the story about a restaurant at the edge of the universe. I was fascinated by the characters and the choices that they make, whether they watch roses perform Shakespeare or bring spring from the backs of giant fish or create a virtual child. Each story is written, edited, and translated by a female and nonbinary team, a team that expresses ideas with concepts that differ once translated to English. It changes how you think of diversity and how language changes our understanding of the world.

If you like collections of stories and essays that blend science fiction and fantasy, that change your perceptions, that create thought and new ideas, I recommend this book. It has beautiful stories full of wonderful ideas. It will fill you with wonder and is a beautiful diversity.

What an absolutely stunning collection. I enjoyed the essays on translation as much as the stories themselves. With some stories, I don't think I fully understood them, but I love that. I love that it's not the same as what's already out there in the English language market. I love that there are stories in styles I need to learn to comprehend. I plan to come back to this collection and reread it in the future, maybe multiple times. I get the feeling that each time, I'll get a little more from the stories and the essays. Looking forward to it.

I really enjoyed this collection. The first short story had me gripped straight away with the elegant tale of the pebbles. I really loved the incorporation of essays, it broke the book up well without being jarring. Towards the end some of these did start to feel a bit like filler but each had a purpose. Possibly just a couple too many. The short stories throughout were brilliant. Would definitely recommend and the fact that it is entirely written by Female and Non Binary creators is the cherry on top of the wonderful cake

Full review here: https://nuvomagazine.com/magazine/summer-2022/books-for-your-summer-reading-list

Following the explosive popularity of works like Liu Cixin’s The Three-Body Problem, Chinese science fiction and fantasy have garnered more and more international attention. The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories: A Collection of Chinese Science Fiction and Fantasy in Translation From a Visionary Team of Female and Nonbinary Creators is a brilliant and expansive survey of Chinese science fiction and fantasy in translation. Children raise stars in their backyards; an alien sifts through inherited memories, untangling histories of climate collapse and betrayal; a shapeshifting fox must serve a cruel thunder god; and a boy is guided through the ocean on the back of a giant fish as he learns how to change the seasons.

The collection is complemented by essays from the translators, which reflect the technical challenges and quirks of translating Chinese to English and sketch a loose historical context for the work, enriching a reader’s understanding of this compelling project.

Together the 22 stories and essays make for perfect summer reading, offering a vast sample of new worlds, imaginative concepts, and thought-provoking twists.

Filled with thought-provoking essays and wonderfully diverse stories. With the unconventional (by Western standards), the stories are very engaging and a pleasure to read. The only unfortunate thing is that the essays, although great in themes and topics feel a bit listless in their train of thought. Otherwise, all authors are worthy of keeping an eye on and reading other works from.

I absolutely love this collection. One of the best I've read (and I'm a sucker for short stories!) so far. Shamans, poets, weather gods, yao gui, time travelers, and more extraordinary characters, meet them all here, in these 17 short stories. I also enjoyed and appreciated the essays that were included, that were mainly about the challenges of translating from Chinese to English, the consideration of translating genders of females and non-binary Chinese writers. I can only imagine the challenges that the translators faced when translating these absolutely beautiful, evocative stories. I often find myself at complete lost trying to translate English to Mandarin and/or Cantonese when speaking to other native speakers or members in my family, I mean, Chinese is already a very complex and complicated language itself, imagine having to translate it into written language and one that fairly close to its the original version! So kudos to the translators.

A full review of the book will be posted on my blog, hookedonbookz.com

Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for a free eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are mine.

The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories
Eds Yu Chen and Regina Kanyu Wang

The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories is a short story anthology that highlights female identified and nonbinary writers and editors, and their exceptional stories.
This was such a pleasure to read as I have wanted to read more SFF and this translated from Chinese drawing from its culture and history made this really special for an #AAPI reader like me.
The variety of stories from sci-fi to dystopian, to contemporary and historical, rounded out this book that I highly enjoyed. I highly recommend it.

The Way Spring Arrives was a mixed bag. This collection of translated sci-fi, fantasy and literary essays was fascinating as a whole. Tonally and thematically this collection was widespread. The stories frequently discussed art, mythology and language and featured some incredible writing. As a general trend, I tended to love the stories about language and mythology. My favourites were the creeping horror tale "Dragonslaying" by Shen Yingying, the AI flash fiction "What Does the Fox Say" by Xia Jia and the food-centric, atmospheric "The Restaurant at the End of the Universe: Tai-Chi Mashed Taro" by Anna Wu. I even discovered an entire subgenre of fantasy, xianxia or cultivation fiction, (seen in stories like "The Way Spring Arrives" by Wang Nuonuo and The Tale of Wude’s Heavenly Tribulation by Count E) that I'd love to read more of.

The standout aspect of the collection was its essays. Writers like Jing Tsu and Xueting Christine Ni among others explored the history and present innovations of female Chinese SFF writers and translators like Rebecca F. Kuang and Emily Xueni Jin among others reflected on the art of translation and its impact on its source text and the audience. Their insights were fascinating; even the more technical and academic essays taught me so much about Chinese SFF.

Unfortunately, a large chunk of the stories within did connect with me. Many of them had interesting premises with lacklustre characters or were simply fine but forgettable making this collection harder to get through than anticipated. I appreciated a lot about The Way Spring Arrives but sadly it had too many misses to be considered a favourite of mine.

Individual Reviews:
The Stars We Raise by Xiu Xinyu (trans. Judy Yi Zhou)
This was a solid speculative short story. The concept of racing baby stars was interesting (plus the stars themselves seemed adorable) but I struggled to connect with the story as a whole. It had a distant narrator which isn’t necessarily a problem but I found the rest of the cast similarly removed. I also found the concept engaging but underexplored. Because of these shortcomings, I don't think the story will stick with me very much.

The Tale of Wude’s Heavenly Tribulation by Count E (trans. Mel "etvolare" Lee)
This fable story didn't quite work for me. Its characters felt flat because they existed as vessels for a message which is a convention of fables. Yet the story itself wasn't that interesting and was a somewhat tedious read.

What Does the Fox Say by Xia Jia
I adored What Does the Fox Say. This flash fiction piece about linguistics, artificial intelligence, and the nuances of language and story was so satisfying to read. There was a cold precision to the diction of the story that fit perfectly with its themes. Its step-by-step breakdown of the ways a hypothetical AI could process language compared to a person was so well rendered. This is the kind of story that could probably only be satisfactorily explored in short fiction and Xia Jia does it well.

Blackbird by Shen Dacheng (trans. Cara Healey)
I struggled to connect with Blackbird. This isn't to say a story about the elderly can't be interesting to me but this particular one left me cold. Maybe it was the lack of a specific narrator or perspective but I didn’t latch on to much of anything about the story.

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe: Tai-Chi Mashed Taro by Anna Wu (trans. Carmen Yiling Yan)
I wasn't expecting to love this story as much as I did. This meditative story unravels itself to you bit by bit. Its beginning is confusing, but as I eventually sank into its layers of food and time travel I grew to love it. The story is about a restaurant at the end of the universe, a mysterious time traveller, and one beautiful meal served to someone in need of it. Its gentle descriptions of a cold winter morning on a snowy lake, and the care put into crafting a fine meal were wonderful to indulge in. Its reflective tone perfectly told the story of its tragic protagonist.

The Futures of Genders in Chinese Science Fiction by Jing Tsu
This essay was a fantastic contextualization of the history of Chinese sci-fi and women’s role in it. Jing Tsu asks a lot of interesting questions about the role of women in stories by female sci-fi authors. She brilliantly challenges the expectation placed on women to centre gender in their writing rather than letting imaginative storytelling drive them. Jing Tsu asks what it means to be a sci-fi author and a woman and how those marginalizations impact an author's imagination brilliantly.

Baby, I Love You by Zhao Haihong (trans. Elizabeth Hanlon)
The concept of Baby, I Love You was intriguing. In it, a man emotionally distant from fatherhood commodifies every aspect of his baby’s life for profit. Seeing this unfold was fascinating. Zhao Haihong's commentary on the ways playing at parenthood in a virtual setting is more satisfying than actual parenthood because of the lack of risk and absolute control was fun to think about.

However, I ultimately wasn’t sold on the emotional arc of the story. Our protagonist learns and grows from his experience but I was unsure how or why his perspective on being a father changed. A more distinct narrative voice may have helped me connect to and understand the protagonist better.

A Saccharophilic Earthworm by BaiFanRuShang (trans. Ru-Ping Chen)
This story was strange. It was about the breakdown of a relationship, yet also incorporated sentient plants for some reason. I assume the plants were a metaphor, but whatever they represented was lost on me.

The Alchemist of Lantian by BaiFanRuShuang (trans. Ru-Ping Chen)
The Alchemist of Lantian stands out mainly because of its crass, embittered narrator. That distinct tone made the story unique, but I found the narrative ultimately unmemorable. Plus the crude language made its centuries-old narrator feel more juvenile than the premise suggested taking me out of the story.

The Way Spring Arrives by Wang Nuonuo (trans. Rebecca F. Kuang)
The blend of mythology, science and coming-of-age in The Way Spring Arrives was just fascinating. Its use of mythology, magic and science to explain the natural world reminded me of Margaret Cavendish's The Blazing World. I loved the elevated and grandiose tone of the story. It was fitting for a mythological tale. This complemented the coming-of-age element of our protagonist's journey well.

Translation as Retelling by Yilin Wang
Translation as Retelling was a fascinating essay about the thought behind Yilin Wang's translation of two stories in this collection. The care Wang placed in conveying the original intent of the stories made me appreciate them all the more.

The Name of The Dragon by Ling Chen (trans. Yilin Wang)
I love a good dragon story but unfortunately, The Name of the Dragon didn’t quite work for me. While I was given some context for the subversion of Chinese dragon mythology central to this story I still felt too removed from this story's cultural context to truly appreciate it.

To Procure Jade by Gu Shi (trans. Yilin Wang)
I liked the folktale vibes of To Procure Jade. The dramatic irony of its ending was particularly delightful. It reminded me of another favourite in the collection The Way Spring Arrives in its mythic tone. Overall it was a short and sweet read.

A Brief History of Beinalan Disasters as Told in a Sinitic Language by Nian Yu (trans. Ru-Ping Chen)
I spent most of this story incredibly confused and a tad bored because of its narrative style. In it, we’re told the history of an alien race and how they managed to survive the downfall of their species. The narrative is largely expository and mired in difficult to parse technical sci-fi detail. The story eventually came together as we got more insight into our narrator. The ultimate twist was exciting and made the narrative a worthwhile read.

Is There Such a Thing as Feminine Quietness?: A Cognitive Linguistics Perspective by Emily Xueni Jin
This essay was a fantastic analysis of the nuances of translation and its ties to cognitive linguistics. In it, translator Emily Xuenli Jin unpacks the specific translation choice of the 2019 Mulan remake by citing the virtue of “feminine quietness” and the implications that translation choice had on the film's themes. She then extrapolates that criticism to the field of Chinese translation as a whole. Jin’s analysis was particularly academic and required close reading to parse. I was overall fascinated by her work. The questions she asked about the role of translators in conveying the entirety of a work’s meaning were fascinating to hear. Her ultimate question about whether the role of a translator is to challenge the gendered implication of work is an intriguing one I wouldn’t mind reading more about. So while occasionally dense it was an insightful read.

Dragonslaying by Shen Yingying (trans. Emily Xueni Jin)
Dragonslaying is one of the most upsetting stories I’ve ever read. Shen Yingying captures creeping dread throughout. Shen has a real talent for visceral, uncomfortable body horror that crawled under my skin. Dragonslaying is also a brilliantly crafted story. Shen structures the tale incredibly well and plays with audience expectation as the true horror of the concept presented slowly unfolds. On a meta level, the cometary about the ways bodies are taken and transformed for the wealthy was well conveyed and the ultimate reveal about how society forces its victims to perpetuate that exploitation made for a fantastically horrific ending to one of the most unsettling stories I’ve ever read.

New Year Painting, Ink and Color on Rice Paper by Chen Qian (trans. Emily Xueni Jin)
While this story had the potential for intrigue, it's about the discovery of a disturbing painting and unravelling the mystery of the small town it came from, I was very distanced from the story because of the narrator and narrative style. Our protagonist is an art restorer and because she was one step removed from the action of the story I never felt fully immersed in it.

The Portrait by Chu Xidao (trans. Gigi Chang)
I’m a little disappointed by 'The Portrait' because while I loved its prose I found it very difficult to follow the plot. It felt as if I was legitimately missing scenes because from moment to moment I didn’t understand what was happening or why. This is a real shame because I loved Chu Xidao’s vivid descriptions and evocative prose.

The Corpse Carrying Woman by Chi Hui (trans. Judith Huang)
This parable-like tale was a fascinating read. Its simple, familiar style made it easy to read and its plot begs to be mined for meaning and metaphor. The story is about a haggard old woman carrying a corpse across the country as various people question her intentions. The story itself could be about a multitude of things and it's the story in this collection I would most like to discuss with an English class because hearing other people’s interpretations could be fascinating.

The Mountain and Their Secret Names by Wang Nuonuo (trans. Rebecca F. Kuang)
The Mountain and Their Secret Names was a well-realized story. Wang Nuonuo was especially good at building tension and drama. The story is about a village victim to the debris of satellite launches that uses ancestor magic from the mountain they live on to predict and redirect the debris paths. I enjoyed the use of our protagonist's connection to his ancestors. The exploration of the weight of that legacy was thematically rich. The relationship between our protagonist and his grandfather, and further his ancestors, was also especially touching to read.

Net Novels and the “She Era” by Xueting Christine Ni
Net Novels and the “She Era” was a fascinating exploration of the impact of the internet and “net novels” on the Chinese literary scene. Xueting Christine Ni Explores the platform women were given by the internet to break into novel writing in the internet era and how this broadening of publishing positively impacted representations of women in Chinese literature and for the first time gave female authors monetary success and literary prominence. Ni also touches on the popular BL genre and how the popularization of androgynous and feminine men clashed with traditional depictions of desirable masculinity. One of the most fascinating aspects of the essay was its exploration of how net novels allowed for sexual liberation and agency for female writers and readers. Overall this was a fascinating essay and incredibly insightful.

Writing and Translation: A Hundred Technical Tricks by Rebecca F. Kuang
Rebecca Kuang ends this collection with one of my favourite works within it. Writing and Translation similarly to Translation as Retelling reflects the role of a translator with their source text. In this essay, Kuang expresses her anxieties as a translator like her authenticity as a Chinese diaspora. She also describes the ways becoming a translator has given her a more intimate understanding of the nuances of storytelling. Her authorial voice was candid, informative and a delightful end to this collection.

The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories is a fascinating collection of Chinese SFF stories giving us a glimpse into a different culture than the one we Westerners are familiar with. Everyone involved in the project, from the contributing authors to the translators and editors, is female or non-binary, meaning The Way Spring Arrives showcases voices that are often overlooked. It also includes essays from the translators and editors explaining the translating choices made and the history of female speculative fiction in China.
I will look at the essays first because they really bring the stories to life. The Future of Gender Chinese Science Fiction by Jing Tsu looks at the history of female voices in Chinese SFF and how they are growing from marginal voices to recognised names. Net Novels and the “She Era” by Xueting Christine Ni charts how publishing has changed and how it allows female authors and readers to connect. I was intrigued to learn about internet authors and how they bypass traditional publishing methods to build a readership.
Translation as Retelling: An Approach to Translating Gu Shi’s “To Procure Jade” and Ling Chen’s “The Name of the Dragon” by Yilin Wang, Is There Such a Thing as Feminine Quietness? A Cognitive Linguistics Perspective by Emily Xueni Jin and Writing and Translation: A Hundred Technical Tricks by Rebecca F. Kuang focus on the choices made during the translation process. As readers, we’re consumers, and it’s easy to sit in our favourite chair with a hot drink and read without really appreciating the work that went into the story. This is especially true of translated stories. These essays show us all the work behind the story and the pitfalls of translation, such as conveying the author’s intent and including extra information necessary for Western readers. Personally, I would have liked this earlier on in the collection, so I was fully appreciative of the effort involved from the beginning.
There is no story theme for the collection, so we have a story an algorithm writing a story based on popular phrases and word associations found online, followed by a story about an old woman cheating death through her overwhelming desire to live, followed by a restaurant at the end of the universe and time travel. This didn’t bother me as the stories were connected by a lyrical prose style which meant each story flowed from one to the other.
My favourite in the collection is Dragonslaying by Shen Yingying and translated by Emily Xueni Jin. Dragonslayers operate on mermaid type creatures splitting their tails and rearranging their organs to create beautiful females for wealthy men. It is a brutal story about the objectification and marginalisation of women told so hauntingly it is shockingly painful.
As with any short story collection, not every piece worked for me, but the majority did, making The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories a worthy addition to any library.

I sincerely believe that The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories Anthology is the biggest work of love and passion I've seen in quite some time. This anthology collects nineteen short stories exploring Chinese science fiction and fantasy.

The thing I love the most about The Way Spring Arrives and Other Stories Anthology, other than the obvious (it is a brilliant collection of stories), is that the creative team is all either female or nonbinary. I love this representation. More, please!

Calling them a collection of short stories is incorrect. There are fictional short stories in here, yes. But there are also reflective and informative essays included in this anthology (see the complete list below). That was a surprise for me, but a pleasant one.

What I loved the most about The Way Spring Arrives because it is a beautiful blend of fantastical stories and informative pieces. As with any anthology, some were stronger than others, and I naturally fell in love with one (The Restaurant at the End of the Universe being my favorite). Overall, I loved the insight and perspectives made available by this collection and strongly urge other fantasy lovers to give it a try.


The Stars We Raised by Xiu Xinyu, translated by Judy Yi Zhou
The Tale of Wude's Heavenly Tribulation by Count E, translated by Mel "etvolare” Lee
What Does the Fox Say by Xia Jia,
Blackbird by Shen Dacheng, translated by Cara Healey
The Restaurant at the end of the Universe: Tai-Chi Mashed Taro by Anna Wu, translated byCarmen Yiling Yan
The Futures of Gender in Chinese Science Fiction by Jing Tsu
Baby, I Love You by Zhao Haihong, translated by Elizabeth Hanlon
A Saccharophilic Earthworm by BaiFanRuShuang, translated by Ru-Ping Chen
The Alchemist of Lantian by BaiFanRuShang, translated by Ru-Ping Chen
The Way Spring Arrives by Wang Nuonuo, translated by Rebecca F. Kuang
Translation as Retelling: An Approach to translating Gu Shi's “To Procure Jade” and Ling Chen's” The Name of the Dragon” by Yilin Wang
The Name of the Dragon by Ling Chen, translated by Yilin Wang
To Procure Jade by Gu Shi, translated by Yilin Wang
A Brief History of Beinakan Disasters as told in a Sinitic Language by Nian Yu, translated by Ru-Ping Chen
Is There Such a Thing as Feminine Quietness? A Cognitive Linguistics Perspective by Emily Xueni Jin
Dragonslaying by Shen Yingying, translated by Emily Xueni Jin
New Year Painting, Ink and Color on Rice Paper, Zhoaqiao Village by Chen Qian, translated by Emily Xueni Jin
The Portrait by Chu Xidao, translated by Gigi Chang
The Woman Carrying a Corpse by Chi Hui, translated by Judith Huang
The Mountain and the Secret of their Names by Wang Nuonuo, translated by Rebecca F. Kuang
Net Novels and the “She Era” How Internet Novels opened the door for Female Readers and Writers in China by Xueting Christine Ni
Writing and Translation: A Hundred Technical Tricks by Rebecca F. Kuang

As with most anthologies this is a mixed bag. Some stories are good, others not so much. Many didn't leave a particularly strong impression.

I have been waiting for something like this for ages.
Beautiful, mesmerizing and enchanting to the core.
The stories are of science fiction genre with liberal amount of fantasy, history and folklores added which makes them even more engrossing.
I loved the story of the Fox and The Thunder god. The first story too had an important lesson to give.
Highly recommended for all.

Extraordinary. The translations are as smooth as one can be, the stories are utterly engrossing and vital pieces of culture. To list my favourites: "The Stars We Raised"" was hauntingly beautiful. "Restaurant at the End of Universe: Tai-Chi Mashed Taro" I think is one of the best things I've read in a while. "The Woman Carrying a Corpse" felt like a folktale I had long forgot. Every minute reading this book was joyous.