Salzman captures post-cultural revolution China through his adventures as a young American English teacher in China and his shifu-tudi (master-student) relationship with China's foremost martial arts teacher.
Editorial Reviews
"The much-acclaimed adventures of a young martial arts master in China take the form of a series of lightly sketched-in episodes; almost without exception, they produce the gulp of feeling you might get from an unusually fine short story, and they reverberate long after you have put them down." --The New York Times
"Salzman demonstrates with skill and subtlety just how Chinese society works." --The Washington Post
"Gong fu, or 'skill that transcends mere surface beauty'...no other term is as apt for a book that describes China and its people with such deftness and delight." --Time
"What is remarkable about Iron & Silk is the charmingly unpretentious manner in which it penetrates a China inaccessible to other foreigners." --L.A. Times
About the Author
Mark Salzman is an award-winning novelist and nonfiction author who has written on a variety of subjects, from a graceful novel about a Carmelite nun’s ecstatic visions and crisis of faith to a compelling memoir about growing up a misfit in a Connecticut suburb – clearly displaying a range that transcends genre. Salzman is the author of Iron & Silk, an account of his two years in China; Lost in Place, a memoir; and the novels The Laughing Sutra, The Soloist, and Lying Awake.
