Murong Xuecun (nom de plume of Hao Qun) is one of China’s most famous authors. Through his novels and narrative non-fiction, he has been a rare independent voice writing from inside China. Murong’s first novel, Leave Me Alone: A novel of Chengdu, took China by storm in 2002. His recent books include the novel Dancing Through Red Dust and the non-fiction People’s Literature Prize winner The Missing Ingredient, a work of undercover investigative reporting on a pyramid scheme. Murong has also written for The New York Times since 2011, including an opinion column from 2013 to 2016.