Lyu is wrongly sent to jail in the mid-1950s, and Su gives birth to her son Su Erbao about 10 months later as gossip circulates about the identity of the father.

But just as the truth is about to emerge, the author stops short of unmasking the man.

Speaking at a recent launch event for the book in Beijing, Wang says he has seldom created a villain in his decades' long writing career, which has seen him pen some 18 million Chinese characters that extend to more than 50 volumes.

"You have to understand everyone, including the people you don't like. They too have their own ethics and a contribution to make," Wang says of the complexity of human nature, adding that his works are "love letters to the world".

The novella unfolds from Dun Kaimao's perspective, who, born in 1946, marries a journalist and later becomes a university lecturer.

He witnesses the transformations in the lives of Su Erbao and his wife Shan Lihong, sometimes trying to intervene in one way or another, in the hope of preventing them from being led astray.

Shan was convinced that Su Erbao would be her partner from the age of 11. She helps with the family chores and takes care of his ailing parents, before finally marrying him at the age of 27.

Dun Kaimao looks on Su Erbao's gradual rise from an irascible overseas student to becoming a successful entrepreneur. Dun Kaimao plots the milestones in Su's life: from becoming the father of twins to embarking on an affair, from his divorce and his failure to marry his lover-to his eventual suicide.

Before he takes his own life, Su Erbao struggles to find meaning in his existence. Swept along by the tumultuous times, he fails to find spiritual release or face up to his conflicting issues about intimacy.

While some readers may doubt the rationale behind Su Erbao's death as seen from a modern societal perspective, Wang says he used the real events that unfolded around him and employed artistic license to present them from an altogether different perspective.