The monk Tangseng and his disciple, the short-tempered Monkey King Sun Wukong, begin their multi-year journey to retrieve Buddhist scriptures from Thunderclap Mountain in India. They first encounter a mysterious river-dwelling dragon, then run into serious trouble while staying in the temple of a 270 year old abbot. Their troubles deepen when they meet the abbot’s friend, a terrifying black bear monster.

This is the 7th book in the best-selling The Journey to the West series of stories for students learning to read Chinese. It is based on the epic 16th century novel of the same name by Wu Chen’en. That novel was inspired by an actual journey by the Buddhist monk Xuanzang, who traveled from Chang’an westward to India in 629 A.D. and returned seventeen years later with priceless knowledge and spiritual texts. Over the course of the book Tangseng and his companions face the 81 tribulations that Tangseng had to endure to attain Buddhahood.

The first 7 books in the Journey to the West series have used a total of about 1200 different Chinese words, but only 572 are used in this book. All new words are defined on the page where they are first used. The book uses Simplified Chinese characters and includes pinyin, an English translation, and a full glossary. A free audiobook is available on YouTube’s Imagin8 Press channel and on www.imagin8press.com.