A novel of man's relationship with nature, faith, and the vitality of storytelling, from celebrated Thai author Saneh Sangsuk. The lovable, yarnspinning monk Luang Paw Tien, now in his nineties, was the last person in his village to bear witness to the power and plenitude of the jungle before agrarian and then capitalist life took over his community. Now he entertains the children of his village nightly with tales from his younger years: his long pilgrimage to India, his mother's dreams of a more stable life through agriculture, his proud huntsman father who resisted those dreams, and his love, who led him to pursue those dreams all over again. Thoroughly entertaining and already beloved, Sangsuk's first novel available in the U.S. is a celebration of the oral tradition of storytelling and that tradition's power to preserve (and embellish) cultural memory.

The village of Praeknamdang, nestled in the Thai jungle, has fallen under the spell of a corrupt religious leader. Only one family dares to resist his growing power: a couple and their talented ten-year-old son. But one day, while playing in the fields, the boy is attacked by a cobra. Locked in a life and death struggle with the snake, the border between the human and the animal disintegrates. Did the boy simply stray too near to a burrow, or is this a punishment for his family's independent spirit? A gripping existential parable, Venom introduces English language readers to the world of Saneh Sangsuk. Lush, raw and lyrical, this is storytelling at its finest.

The scandalous 1994 Thai novel hailed as a world-class masterpiece