The Substance of Fiction: Literary Objects in China, 1550–1775 By Sophie Volpp. Premodern East Asia New Horizons. New York: Columbia University Press, 2022. x + 245 pp. $140.00 (cloth), $35.00 (paper), $34.99 (eBook)

all: It will at certain points be too elemental to academic readers and at others too complex for the uninitiated. This book has caught on in a big way with the wider public, acquiring far more reviews than your average academic book. What can be the causes of such success? Aside from an active agent and a motivated trade press, part of the answer is the mixture of explanations of common events and trends in modern Chinese history aimed at educated nonspecialists. The fact that the author is Chinese herself and a professor at Yale certainly enhance the appeal to that audience. I would argue, though, that a major share of the attraction in the wider educated community of readers is what has become known as “Orientalism,” a term I personally despise but which seems to capture the exoticization of all things intellectually Chinese (and Japanese, by the way). Those of us who have spent the lion’s share of our lives working with the Chinese language have long ago overcome this infatuation, but for those who see Chinese as infinitely complicated and a wonder to behold, a book like Tsu’s poses as simultaneously authoritative and explanatory.