Monkey King: Journey to the West

About

The Monkey King — immortal, invincible, magnificently arrogant — has conquered heaven and been imprisoned under a mountain for his trouble. Released after five hundred years, he is tasked with escorting a Buddhist monk across China to retrieve sacred scriptures, accompanied by a pig-demon and a river monster. The journey involves eighty-one trials, each more inventive than the last, and a protagonist who cannot stop causing problems even when salvation depends on good behavior. This new one-volume translation, with a foreword by Neil Gaiman, brings China's most beloved fantasy epic to English readers in its most accessible form. The Monkey King is one of world literature's great characters — a trickster who is simultaneously the story's hero, its comic relief, and its greatest obstacle. The fantasy novel that predates all others — and remains, after five centuries, the wildest, funniest, and most irresistible adventure story ever told.