The Road Home

Jie Fang,a boy whose name is synonymous with "liberation," has a peculiar fascination with gunpowder. He accidentally brings trouble upon his family one day when he asks his father to paint a picture of his favorite war hero, Dong Cunrui, below the portrait of Chairman Mao. Despite his father’s loyal devotion to the Party, the newly-drawn painting of the famous bomber who sacrificed himself for his country is interpreted as an attempt to blow up the chairman in a counter-revolutionary act. When his father is taken away, Jie Fang faces bullying from a clique of classmates. As the feud between them escalates, Jie Fang’s unexpected discovery of a bomb leads him to continue exploring his unusual affinity for gunpowder, and what it means to truly be a "hero."

Ai Wei (née Zhu Xiongwei) is known for his novels Sunny Day, Comrade Lover, Lover Sinned, and his fiction collections Countryside Movie, Sound on the Water, Sisters, and Flower in the Water. He is the first Zhejiang Literature Star and one of the Fifty Best Writers of Zhejiang. He is also the winner of People’s Literature Biennial Awards and Contemporary Literature Awards. He works at Literature Bay magazine.