Set during the fall-out of the Cultural Revolution, these bizarre and delicate stories capture magnificently the collision of the old China of vanished dynasties, with communism and today's tiger economy. The mad woman on the bridge wears a historical gown which she refuses to take off. In the height of summer, to the derision of the townspeople, she stands madly on the bridge. Until a young female doctor, bewitched by the beauty of the mad woman's dress, plots to take it from her, with tragic consequences. From the folklorist who becomes the victim of his own rural research, to the doctor whose infertility treatment brings about the birth of a monster child, to a young thief who steals a red train only to have it stolen from him, Su Tong's stories are a scorching look at humanity.