Will the Boat Sink the Water? The Life of China’s Peasants
By Chen Guidi and Wu Chuntao translated by Zhu Hong
Public Affairs, Perseus Books, New York, $25

China’s national audit office announced a new code of conduct after a macabre incident last week, when one of its auditors died of “excessive drinking and eating” at banquets hosted by the local electricity bureau whose books he was screening. His fellow auditors did not rush home in grief after their colleague’s death. Reportedly too upset to continue work after the bureau’s grande bouffe, they went on an all-expenses-paid trip elsewhere in China the next day to relax.