Rebirth 2004: A lone figure in the literary world

Chapter 46: Hot Warm-up

On March 2004, 3, the latest issue of Huacheng arrived in the hands of readers.

Old subscribers immediately felt something was wrong. Why was this issue so much thicker? They opened it and saw - wow, 274 pages, a full 30 pages more.

The original price of Huacheng was 1.2 yuan per issue, and it was 340 pages thick. By 1986, the sales of the pure literature journal could no longer be maintained, and the magazine was unable to make ends meet, so it had to be reduced to about 240 pages. In the late 80s, it was forced to raise the price per issue to 3.5 yuan, with the number of pages remaining unchanged, and began to accept advertising.

Now 15 years have passed, and prices have increased several times. Huacheng can only cautiously raise the price to 9.9 yuan, but sales are still collapsing every year.

Fortunately, Huacheng Publishing House is a comprehensive publishing house, and its other businesses such as book publishing can maintain the operation of the magazine; and the magazine provides blood for book publishing, so it is a virtuous circle.

They even printed more copies of this issue? Let’s take a look at what was printed.

Seeing the name of Young Babylon and Zhang Chao, many old readers frowned. These people are very traditional fans of pure literature and serious literature. Their impression of Zhang Chao is that he is a trend-setter who is often in the news, impetuous, superficial, and has nothing to do with pure literature.

"Degenerate! Degenerate! I didn't expect Huacheng to be degenerate!" An old professor who teaches literary theory at a university's liberal arts college slammed the new issue of Huacheng on the table. As a professional, he has a strong obsession with aesthetic cleanliness.

The old professor's movements attracted the attention of his family. His granddaughter, who had just entered high school, obediently poured him a glass of water and asked, "Grandpa, who made you angry again?"

The old professor pointed at the magazine, still indignant, and said, "A good copy of Huacheng was soiled by this devil!"

The granddaughter looked straight over and saw that the magazine had just turned to the page of "Young Babylon". Under the big title, the small name of the author caught her attention -

Zhang Chao! ?
The granddaughter suppressed her excitement and curiosity and asked her grandfather in a calm tone, "Who is this Zhang Chao?"

The old professor sighed and explained, "A high school student who is a little older than you spends all day hyping up news in the newspapers, writing things that attract attention. Even with this, he was hyped up as a 'young genius'. I think he is a 'young devil'!"

The granddaughter was delighted, it was indeed him, so she reached out and took the Huacheng magazine away.

The old professor asked curiously, "Don't you never read these literary magazines?"

The granddaughter made a face at him and said, "Calm down, I will criticize him for you first!" Then she took the magazine and went back to her room.

The girl did not rush to read the novel, but turned on her computer, dialed up the Internet, logged into QQ, and found a group chat called "Lifetime Love Tide 15 Group" and sent a message:
"GGMMs, do you know what I discovered? Chao Xi GG published a novel in Huacheng magazine, so you don't have to wait any longer..."

This sentence triggered hundreds of new messages, and many confused group members were asking:
"MM is so cool!"

"Is it really written by Tide GG?"

"What is Huacheng magazine? Where can I buy it?"

"What's the name of the novel?"

"Young Babylon? How cool!"

"I'm going to the newsstand now to have a look..."

(I get goosebumps while writing this...)
Such conversations, like a virus, spread to hundreds of chat groups in a very short time.

The girl's vanity was greatly satisfied. After answering the questions from her group members, she started watching "Young Babylon".

Hey, they are both "youth", why is it different from "Youth Like You"? I don't understand...

The girl read more than a thousand words and felt more and more confused. Why is the character a child at one moment and a young man at another? Sometimes it is this person telling the story, and sometimes it is that person again...

Was this really written by Zhang Chao?
Confused, the girl took the magazine and found the old professor again and asked, "Grandpa, why can't I understand this "Young Babylon"? Can you help me explain it, what is the story of this novel?"

The old professor took the magazine unhappily and muttered, "How can this novel be so difficult to understand? I usually ask you to read more books, but you only know how to surf the Internet..."

Complaints aside, the granddaughter's request must be met. The old professor put on his glasses again and read Young Babylon carefully. "... Hmm? Was this really written by that 'little devil'?" After reading the beginning, the old professor was also confused.

Old Chen, who runs a newsstand in Yangcheng, was also confused. Early that morning, seven or eight young people—all of them high school students—came to him and asked if he had the March issue of Huacheng for sale.

Pure literature magazines like Huacheng have always been slow-selling items in newsstands. If it weren't for the unified distribution, he wouldn't have bought any. In his case, Huacheng sold more in three years than Story Club sold in three days.

The only two copies of Huacheng had already been sold, and people who wanted to buy it kept coming to ask. Old Chen panicked and quickly called the distribution department to ask for 2 more copies of Huacheng.

People told him, "You called too late. They've already been sold out. You can't find any in the whole city now!"

The most confused was Huacheng Magazine. The office phone was bombarded with calls early in the morning. Orders for additional March issues from all over the country came in like snowflakes.

A quick count by noon showed that the number of orders had exceeded 10, and the phone calls had not stopped, with orders still increasing.

This confused the editor-in-chief and president Xiao Jianguo. He arranged for the printing factory to work overtime and called all the editors to the office for a meeting to analyze the reasons.

Hearing her colleagues talking at once, Zhu Yanling just smiled and remained silent.

Tian Ying was sharp-eyed. Seeing her calmness, he asked, "Xiao Zhu, tell me."

Zhu Yanling then spoke up: "What is the reason? It's not the lice on the monk's head - isn't it obvious? There is only one change between this issue of the magazine and the previous ones. It's not the reason, what is it?"

"Are you talking about Zhang Chao's "Young Babylon"? That's too arbitrary."

"He has some fans, but they are all high school students, and the oldest is only in their twenties, right? We are a pure literature magazine."

Zhu Yanling sighed and said, "You all underestimated him, and you also underestimated the Internet."

"network?"

Zhu Yanling didn't say anything, but walked to Xiao Jianguo's desk, logged into her QQ on his computer, and clicked "Search QQ Group by Keyword", entered "Zhang Chao" and "Chao Xi" respectively, and then clicked OK -

Suddenly, QQ groups with these two keywords poured down like a waterfall.

“一生爱潮汐1、2、3、4、5、6、7、8、9……”

“挚爱潮汐1、2、3、4、5、6、7、8、9……”

“潮言汐语1、2、3、4、5、6、7、8、9……”

最朴素的就是“张潮粉丝群1、2、3、4、5、6、7、8、9……”

When I clicked on them, I found that each group had at least 3 people, and at most to people. Most of them were discussing whether they had bought or how to buy the March issue of Huacheng.

The editors watching the scene felt their scalps tingling!

The power of the Internet is so terrifying!
Zhu Yanling said: "When I heard about this this morning, I was wondering if it had anything to do with Zhang Chao. Then I thought of the QQ group my son likes to play in recently, so I tried it, but I didn't expect..."

At this time, the editor who was in charge of answering the phone came in and reported: "President, there are too many orders and we can't print them all."

Xiao Jianguo said hurriedly: "I will go to coordinate. We must seize the opportunity and not let pirates take advantage of the loophole."

Tian Ying laughed and said, "Xiao Zhu, you said at the time that you wanted to use this novella to warm up for the novel that Zhang Chao was going to publish. Isn't this warm-up too hot? It's so hot!"

(End of this chapter)