"The Executioner Silversmith: The Dust Settles" Author: Alai Zhejiang Literature and Art Publishing House

▷It complements and reflects on "Dust Settles" and depicts a panoramic picture of the eve of the collapse of the Tusi system.

▷The executioner who died in the Poppy War, the proud silversmith who worked in the moonlight, the Tibetan folk wise man Agu Dunba...

▷Minor characters in "Dust Settles" take center stage and become the core of the story

————————

【Content Introduction】

"The Executioner and the Silversmith - A Sequel to "Dust Settles"" is a wonderful sequel and "extra story" to "Dust Settles", a work that won Alai the Mao Dun Literature Prize. This work was created before and after Alai completed his novel "Dust Settles", and it is based on and extended three related or underdeveloped characters in the novel.

Among them, there are executioners passed down from generation to generation in the Tusi family, and the "Poppy War" that influenced the historical direction of the Tusi system was reshaped through the eyes of the executioners; there is also a genius silversmith who walked out of the moonlight in "Dust Settles", and the power struggle and change of the Tusi family were reflected through the silversmith's proud life; and there is also Agu Dunba, a wise man in Tibetan folk tales. Inspired by this, Alai created the "image of a fool young master who is about to emerge" in "Dust Settles".

These "external chapters" are not only an organic supplement to "When the Dust Settles", but also reflect each other with "When the Dust Settles". While highlighting the infinite charm of literature itself, they, together with "When the Dust Settles", outline a three-dimensional picture of the eve of the collapse of the chieftain system on the snowy plateau.

————————

【Recommended by media and celebrities】

The language is light, charming, and full of lively poetry, showing the author's outstanding artistic talent.

——Award Speech for the Fifth Mao Dun Literature Prize

I believe that, for Alai, writing is a divine thing. Everything is left to chance. When the opportunity comes, the story will naturally emerge from someone's consciousness and spread in the world.

——Tie Ning

The success of "Dust Settles" is not so much a success in narrative as it is a success in language. Ultimately, it is a success in poetic and heterogeneous expression.

——Jidi Maga

His storytelling is a game of signifiers, renaming everything in his world with extraordinary sensibility. Then, the dust settled.

——Li Jingze

With his determination, creativity and tenacious spirit of exploration as a writer, Alai was able to creatively absorb the magical realism elements of Latin America, while successfully breaking away from the influence of Latin American novel masters, thus avoiding becoming a reptile crawling at the feet of the masters.

——Qiu Huadong

Alai's novels are full of a sense of "simplicity and simplicity", which is "anti-technical" in a certain sense. His words run freely in the fictional space. The language is simple, plain, elegant, and poetic, natural and not gorgeous, especially the "simplicity", which is mature and honest. Therefore, such "simplicity" is inevitably accompanied by strange "Zen" that sometimes goes beyond the boundaries of narrative.

——Zhang Xuexin

Rather than saying that Alai is good at telling stories about Tibetan life, it is better to say that he is good at telling stories about the division, hesitation, anxiety and pain of people living in the cracks of heterogeneous cultures.

——Zhang Li

Alai

A famous writer and winner of the Mao Dun Literature Prize. Born in Maerkang County, Aba Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province in 1959, he graduated from Maerkang Teachers College. He was the editor-in-chief, editor-in-chief and president of Chengdu Science Fiction World magazine, and is currently the chairman of the Sichuan Writers Association.

He started writing poetry in 1982 and later turned to novels. His major works include: the poetry collection "Lingmo River", the novel collections "Bloodstains of the Old Year" and "Silversmith in the Moonlight", the long essays "Stairs of the Earth" and "Utopia of Grass and Trees", and the novels "Dust Settles", "Jicun Epic" (six parts), "King Gesar", "Zhan Dui", "Cloud Records", etc.

In 2000, his first novel, The Dust Settles, won the "Fifth Mao Dun Literature Award". In 2009, he won the "Seventh Chinese Literature Media Award • Outstanding Writer of the Year Award" for his six-part work, The Epic of Jicun. In 2018, Mushroom Circle won the "Seventh Lu Xun Literature Award for Novella". In 2019, Notes in the Clouds won the "Five One Project" Outstanding Work Award of the Central Propaganda Department.