Monkey King

Journey to the West

By: Wu Cheng'en, Julia Lovell, Julia Lovell - editor, Julia Lovell - introduction, Gene Luen Yang - introduction, Julia Lovell - translator

Narrated by: Robert Wu

A Chinese Lord of the Rings and one of the all-time great fantasy novels--which Neil Gaiman has said "is in the DNA of 1.5 billion people"--now in a thrilling new translation

A shape-shifting trickster on a kung-fu quest for eternal life, Monkey King is one of the most memorable superheroes in world literature. High-spirited and omni-talented, he amasses dazzling weapons and skills on his journey to immortality: a gold-hooped staff that can grow as tall as the sky and shrink to the size of a needle; the ability to travel 108,000 miles in a single somersault. A master of subterfuge, he can transform himself into whomever or whatever he chooses and turn each of his body's 84,000 hairs into an army of clones. But his penchant for mischief repeatedly gets him into trouble, and when he raids Heaven's Orchard of Immortal Peaches and gorges himself on the elixirs of the gods, the Buddha pins him beneath a mountain, freeing him only five hundred years later for a chance to redeem himself: He is to protect the pious monk Tripitaka on his fourteen-year journey to India in search of precious Buddhist sutras that will bring enlightenment to the Chinese empire.

Joined by two other fallen immortals--Pigsy, a rice-loving pig able to fly with its ears, and Sandy, a depressive man-eating river-sand monster--Monkey King undergoes eighty-one trials, doing battle with Red Boy, Princess Jade-Face, the Monstress Dowager, and all manner of dragons, ogres, wizards, and femmes fatales, navigating the perils of Fire-Cloud Cave, the River of Flowing Sand, the Water-Crystal Palace, and Casserole Mountain, and being serially captured, lacquered, sautéed, steamed, and liquefied, but always hatching an ingenious plan to get himself and his fellow pilgrims out of their latest jam.

Monkey King: Journey to the West is at once a rollicking adventure, a comic satire of Chinese bureaucracy, and a spring of spiritual insight. With this new translation, the irrepressible rogue hero of one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature has the potential to vault, with his signature cloud-somersault and unerring sense for fun, into the hearts of millions of Americans.

Weird but funny

Going through this story was a wild ride. I had a lot of belly laughs and WTF moments when the story got to the more weirder parts. I think my only critique is when the narrator was explaining the story reveals a lot of spoilers up to the late part of the story

DragonBall Z and ABC

Really enjoyed this! The foreward is very good, the introduction is very educational, and the story has the base plots for several current series (American Born Chinese and DragonBall) and some classics. It is a fun story, well paced, with a good plot.

Really good and funny

I really enjoyed this story and it's genuinely funny. I laughed more at the scenes in this book than any other I've read. Its a pretty wild and crazy story and the Monkey and Pigsy characters adds a lot of humor with their antics.

The translation and voice actor are excellent. I can't be sure how accurate it is the the original archaic chinese, but it's been translated into quite modern English which flows well and the narrator does and excellent job with many distinct voices.

Great story

Facinating tale of a monkey and his friends seeking enlightenment. Great character growth and plenty of good humor.

Enjoyed every bit of it. Translation🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥

Translation was excellent. Voice work brought each character to life, 10/10 would recommend. TY.