Hospital
3 primary works
Book 1
From acclaimed Chinese author Han Song comes a twisted, experimental narrative of one man’s mysterious illness and his journey through a dystopian hospital system.
When Yang Wei travels to C City for work, he expects nothing more than a standard business trip. A break from his day-to-day routine, a good paycheck, a nice hotel—nothing too extravagant, of course. No fuss, but all the amenities.
But this is where his problems begin. A complimentary bottle of mineral water from the hotel minibar results in sudden and debilitating stomach pain, followed by unconsciousness. When he wakes three days later, things don’t improve; they get worse. With no explanation, the hotel forcibly sends him to a hospital for examination. There, he receives no diagnosis, no discharge date…just a diligent guide to the labyrinthine medical system he’s now circulating through.
Armed with nothing but his own confusion, Yang Wei travels deeper into the inner workings of the hospital and the secrets it’s hiding from the patients. As he seeks escape and answers, one man’s illness takes him on a quest through a corrupt system and his own troubled mind.
Book 2
Yang Wei wakes to find himself still a patient at the hospital. Somehow, he’s aged decades overnight and is confined to the geriatric ward on a massive Hospital ship as it floats along a bloodred sea full of unsightly things. But human remains and sea nymphs are perhaps nothing compared to the goings-on belowdecks.
The doctors are nowhere to be found, replaced by a procession of medical robots from whom, of course, no information can be gleaned. So Yang Wei, along with a small group of patients—all just as aged as he is—venture out to explore the uncharted depths of the ship and the answers that are surely hidden within.
As they delve deeper into both the ship and why they’re on it, every uncovered secret comes with its own questions. The only thing Yang Wei can be sure of is that the more he learns, the less he understands…and the less he truly wants to know.
Book 3
From acclaimed author Han Song comes the final installment in Yang Wei’s journey through a dystopian hospital system, touching down on the red planet, where more than Yang’s nightmare is reborn.
The Hospital Ship is no more, and Yang Wei awakens to find himself at the mercy of monstrous doctors and the tumult of his own mind. Not helping matters, of course, is the Mars Hospital’s Pool of Dead Souls. A ghastly body of water, it traps people in an endless cycle of treatment, death, and resurrection.
When an unruly band of patients revolts against this suffering, the Hospital descends into chaos, the likes of which have never been seen before. Strident order falls to madness, unfolding in fits and bursts of violence and carnivalesque celebration. The effect is so jarring that Yang Wei begins to question what he can trust to be real—is reality what he sees…or what he thinks?
Told through an absurdist lens, Dead Souls takes sharp twists and turns ever deeper into Yang Wei’s strange world of the grotesque and ambiguous, bringing the Hospital series to its shocking conclusion.