This is the home of the awarding winning English language wuxia novel, Dream of the Dragon Pool - A Daoist
Quest.
*ForeWord Magazine Book of the Year, 2007 Award Finalist - final awards to be announced May 29th at BookExpo America in L.A.
*Online Review of Books & Current Affairs Fiction Book of the Year 2007
*National Best Book 2007 Awards, Award Winning Finalist, Fantasy/Science Fiction
*Numerous Amazon.com 5 Star Reviews - check out "REVIEWS" page on this website.
Visit my new writer's blog, Wuxia Novelist: A Writer's Blog
1. To introduce my wuxia novel, Dream of the Dragon Pool - A Daoist Quest, published by Pleasure
Boat Studio, a New York City literary press.
2. To use my four decades of China study to fully introduce this great wuxia (Chinese-style heroic fiction) genre
to the literary world beyond East Asia. I would like to make wuxia an accepted English language story genre.
3. To chronicle this writer's life in the attempt to establish this exciting genre.
Oh, yeah. To explain what jiang-hu means in ten words or less. DONE! see the 12/10/06 installment of the Wandering
Blades Blog where I do it in ONE word!
The Wandering Blades Blog discusses the background of the wuxia genre in Chinese literature
and the youxia (wandering blades or swordsmen and swordswomen) who are at the core of this genre.
While my other blog, Wuxia Novelist: A Writer's Blog, will look at the contemporary writing aspect
of this fascinating genre.
Front Cover & Galley Proof Back Cover
Rear Cover Text:
Dream of the Dragon Pool – A Daoist Quest is a multifaceted novel woven around the historical
fact of the death-sentence exile of China’s best loved poet-adventurer, Li Bo (also Li Bai, 701-762 A.D.). This is an
adventure story of magic, myth, and occult powers written as traditional Chinese-style heroic fiction.
Forced by the emperor’s exile order, Li Bo travels up the great Yangtze River toward certain death in distant Burma/Myanmar.
Yet Li, not so concerned by his imminent death, regards his trip as a quest for his lost sense of poetic inspiration. Along
the way, he unwittingly befriends the emperor’s most powerful shamaness who is trying to escape from the palace to Mount
Wu and serve the mythical Rain Goddess, mistress of that sacred mountain. Li Bo accidentally awakens the dark forces of the
Blood Dragon and its ghostly slaves. They are in pursuit of a magical sword, the legendary Dragon Pool Sword that Li Bo finds
himself in possession of after a dream visit from a Daoist Immortal.
The cast is rounded out by Li’s traveling companion, a wandering blade veteran of the Tang dynasty’s Central Asian
conquests, known as the “Iron Talon;” a mysterious swordsman-musician, who travels with a ghost-catching drunken
monkey; a “dream assassin,” capable of killing people from within their dreams; and a blond, green-eyed, Central
Asian female ghost, enslaved by the Blood Dragon’s powers. The characters, settings, and sensibilities are inspired
by the romantic and flamboyant Tang dynasty “tales of wonder” and woven together by the author, a veteran medieval
China scholar turned novelist.
Albert A. Dalia is a China scholar with four decades of study, research, and experience in medieval Chinese
history and culture. Two decades ago, after earning two masters degrees and a Ph.D. in Chinese history and religion, he turned
to fiction writing and produced a series of published short stories and, now, his first novel. For more information, please
go to www.aadalia.com.
Revised ISBN: 978-1-929355-34-1
Li Bo (701-752 CE)
Painting by Liang Kai, 13th century
My Chinese-style Heroic Fiction Novel
Dream of the Dragon Pool is a multifaceted work. From one perspective it can be read as a Daoist ghost story.
What happens in the opening chapter at the Dream Temple sets course for the rest of the story.
Yet, the novel is also a historical fiction. Historically, Li Bo was known for his prodigious capacity for wine. It is said
that his poetry was measured by the cupful - some say by the gallon full. He was also known as a wandering blade in his younger
years, claiming to have killed a number of people in sword fights.
The novel mixes historical fact with the imagination of medieval Chinese thinkers, poets, and storytellers, thus it could
also be labeled a historical fantasy. I have attempted to combine all of these genres into a Chinese-style heroic fiction
novel. I leave it to my readers to see if this works for them.
CLICK on the Link Below to read from DREAM of the DRAGON POOL!
My fiction is focused on 7th through 8th century China, the early decades of the great Tang dynasty (618-907 CE). This era
of Chinese history was my academic major as a historian, and as a fiction writer it remains the time and place that I am most
in love with.
Exploring the Idea of the Hero
As for the theme of my fiction, I am most interested in the concept of the hero - please note that whenever I refer to the
"hero," I am referring to both male and female; much as the word "actor" is coming to refer to both male and female performers
- the use of "actress" seems to be in decline.
Further, that while most will call the Chinese genre that my fiction has adopted wuxia xiaoshuo, frequently translated
as "martial arts fiction," I translate it as “heroic fiction.” The translation “martial arts” too strongly
implies the contemporary style of Chinese action/adventure movies and thus is too easily dismissed by some as “chopsocky”
or some other disparaging reference. While this might be understandable given some of the movies produced in Asia, these disparaging
references are unfortunate and quite incorrect when referring to the traditional literary genre that is the basis of Asian
action/adventure cinema.
My fiction writing is aimed at exploring the concept of the hero as defined in traditional Chinese literature. Thus, I will
avoid the term “martial arts” when referring to my fiction and instead refer to it as “Chinese-style heroic
fiction.” I intend to further develop these ideas in the “Wandering Blades Blog,” that is linked to this
site.
I have already published a number of short stories in the Chinese heroic fiction style that I’ve combined with the traditional
Chinese “strange story” genre or in more a Western appreciation, the Chinese ghost story. Those stories are in
the process of being rewritten and will gradually be available for sale on the Amazon Shorts program on Amazon.com. However,
in the meantime, I'll be placing some of them on both this website and my blog, Wuxia Novelist.
Man-zou!
Albert A. Dalia, The Innkeeper
Note: The Dragon Gate Inn painting and the cover art for Dream of the Dragon Pool are by Jing-hua Gao Dalia. Visit her sites:
I hope you have a good time visiting the Inn. After your visit, I'd enjoy having your comments, ideas, and/or questions. The
form below is provided for your thoughts. The Innkeeper.
Wuxia xiaoshuo: Chinese-style Heroic Fiction
The Dragon Gate Inn: Home of the Wandering Blades Grotto Store
