We’re completely thrilled to see contributing editor Madeleine Thien’s new novel, Do Not Say We Have Nothing, on the shortlist for the Man Booker Prize for Fiction. Her exquisite novel tells the story of a family of musicians in revolutionary China, from the first days of Chairman Mao’s ascent to the Shanghai Conservatory in the 1960s and the events leading to the protests in Tiananmen Square in 1989.

In her Brick 95 piece on reading Dream of the Red Chamber, Thien tells the story of encountering in real life the story of a book just like the one she had written into this incredible novel.