Rebirth 04: Starting from Taking an Unconventional Approach

At eight o'clock the next morning, the sun shone on Twin Hills, making Bluebird Publishing House sparkle like crystal.

Han Fei sat in the lobby of the publishing house and yawned. Yesterday's dinner was perfect; even now, his burps still tasted of rock sugar turtle. After dinner, he and Zhang Ruiyi went to the Jiaotong University Affiliated Hospital. Han Baohua was already asleep. Han Fei gently placed a magazine on the bedside table, and at seven o'clock in the morning, Han Baohua called to say that he was reading the magazine and was very satisfied.

Han Fei looked up from the Xinmin Evening News and watched as the first early-rising employee swiped his ID card on the time clock.

"So early?" Han Fei said.

Sun Yue smiled and nodded, then took a stack of manuscript paper from her bag and handed it to Han Fei: "These are the sample drafts that I had those authors write in the current style. Take a look. I talked to them about the terms last time, and they are all willing to sign contracts."

"Oh?" Han Fei took the manuscript. "Okay, go and get ready. Once everyone's here, we'll start delivering the magazines to the outlets."

Han Fei shifted into a more comfortable sitting position, opened the manuscript, and began to read, his heart pounding with excitement.

The first piece is called "The Birthday Banquet," and it's about a conflict between a mother-in-law and daughter-in-law. The first sentence is: "On my mother-in-law's 80th birthday, I poisoned her favorite braised pork. It wasn't an impulsive act. It was because for twenty years since I married into this family, she had been putting sand in my bowl for twenty years."

The author later recounts the grievances between the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law over the past twenty years. There's the story of the mother-in-law standing at the door of the bridal chamber on their wedding night, ordering her daughter-in-law to sleep on the floor; and the mother-in-law waiting outside the delivery room on the day of childbirth, only to turn and leave upon learning that a girl had been born...

Finally, at the birthday banquet, the mother-in-law picked up the first piece of meat, put it in her mouth, chewed it twice, and her face changed. She secretly told her daughter-in-law a secret: before the banquet began, she had poisoned the tea her daughter-in-law was drinking. Just then, the siren of an ambulance sounded outside; someone had called an ambulance in advance. At that moment, both the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law grinned.

Han Fei thinks the most impressive thing about this article is that it portrays the hatred between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law like a spy movie. The suspense left at the end can trigger a series of thoughts, starting with "who called the ambulance" and leading to "if it was one of the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law who called it, was it for themselves or for the other party?" and "did the daughter-in-law discover that her mother-in-law had poisoned her before she did?" It is estimated that it can make people argue about it for three days.

The second article, "Performance Report," is a cathartic piece written for working professionals, taking the perennial pain point of subordinates turning the tables on their superiors to a whole new level.

On the day of my year-end performance review, the last page of my PowerPoint presentation wasn't a summary of my achievements, but a photograph.

In the photo, my boss and the owner of a competitor company are sitting on opposite sides of the same tea table, with a manila envelope in the middle. All thirty-odd people in the meeting room, including the big boss, are staring at that photo.

The boss's face turned white, then blue, and finally liver-colored.

Finally, the protagonist received a notification from HR that his boss had been suspended pending investigation, and the protagonist was being transferred back to headquarters to temporarily take his place. The notification ended with the line, "Next time, before setting up a scheme, go through the proper procedures first," a statement that was both ruthless and humorous.

The third story, "Night Shift," deals with a midlife crisis. It tells the story of a middle-aged man who is torn in two by life, working as a manager by day and carrying corpses at a funeral home by night, yet he still grits his teeth and perseveres. This is clearly a work of realism, but the overall style still fits the mold of new media fiction.

Han Fei was satisfied and found himself sitting on the edge of the chair. He found Sun Yue and told her that all three authors could be signed.

Before 8:30, everyone from the publishing house had arrived. Zhang Ruiyi was the last to jump out of the car and rush through the gate.

Han Fei assigned Lu Hai and Sun Yue to newsstands at various train and bus stations, Cheng Xu and Zhou Tao to manage the newspaper and magazine shelves in major supermarkets, and Zhang Meimei and Zheng Xiaowen to stay at the publishing house to organize newly arrived manuscripts.

"Ruiyi and I are going to the Shanghai Book City," Han Fei said finally. "The second batch of magazines will arrive this afternoon. Everyone, hurry up and try to get all the first batch out by this morning."

"Boss," Zhang Meimei said, "you don't need to go yourself, right? I can do it."

"It's different. Shanghai Bookstore is the core channel. I need to meet with the purchasing manager in person to see if we can open more bookstores next month."

......

The Shanghai Bookstore is located at the intersection of Fuzhou Road Cultural Street and Hubei Road, less than one kilometer away from Qingniao Publishing House.

Fuzhou Road Cultural Street is the oldest bookstore street in Shanghai, with bookstores dating back to the late Qing Dynasty. Large and small bookstores, old and new, stand side-by-side. Shanghai Book City is located on this street and is also the largest Xinhua Bookstore in Shanghai. The bookstore building is off-white, occupies a large area, and has over twenty floors. The first seven floors are the bookstore's sales area, while the upper floors are mostly office space.

Han Fei and Zhang Ruiyi drove to the bookstore and could see the bookshelves and readers inside through the huge glass windows on the first and second floors.

"Is it okay for you to take one pack?" Han Fei asked.

The two got out of the car, and Han Fei placed a packet of magazines on Zhang Ruiyi's outstretched arms. The packet contained fifty magazines and weighed about fifteen pounds. Han Fei slowly released his grip, and Zhang Ruiyi's arms sank slightly downwards.

"No problem," Zhang Ruiyi said immediately.

"Sure?"

"Um."

Han Fei raised his right eyebrow, picked up the remaining three packets of magazines, and strode towards the entrance of the bookstore.

They walked through the spring-loaded doors. Han Fei looked around and saw various themed zones, audio-visual product zones, new book recommendation zones, and key bestseller zones at the entrance. The most eye-catching feature was a tower of books made up of bestselling works such as "The Da Vinci Code" and "Ice Fantasy," with a large, prominent poster next to it.

A young woman stood behind the cashier. Han Fei approached the cashier and simply said, "Bluebird Publishing House, delivery."

The woman nodded, almost bowing, and quickly walked to the right corridor, knocking on a glass door. A man of about forty years old, wearing a short-sleeved shirt, came out of the door and walked towards Han Fei.

Han Fei introduced himself and Zhang Ruiyi. After entering, Zhang Ruiyi simply stood by the door and watched.

"My name is Shen Jian, purchasing manager." The man said, taking the magazine from Zhang Ruiyi and leading them inside. "Your people just came to talk a couple of days ago. I didn't expect the magazine to be out so quickly. It was President Han who came in person."

"Manager Shen, you're too kind," Han Fei said. "This is the first batch of two hundred books that we agreed upon beforehand. We owe it all to your help in getting them into the bookstore so smoothly. Especially regarding the admission fee, I'll remember that favor."

Shen Jian smiled slightly: "The main reason is that your data is indeed impressive."