The book tells the story of how some of China's most famous writers, filmmakers and artists overcame repression and censorship to form a nationwide movement challenging the Communist Party's control of history on its soil.

The Past - a battlefield in many countries, but in China it is critical to political power. In traditional China, dynasties rewrote history to justify their rule by arguing that their predecessors were unworthy of power. Marxism put a modern spin on this, depicting history as an unstoppable force marching toward the triumph of communism. The Chinese Communist Party draws on these ideas to glorify its rule.

In recent years, a network of independent writers, artists and filmmakers has begun to challenge the CCP. Drawing on years of research into Xi Jinping's China, Sparks challenges stereotypes of a China where the state has suppressed all free thought, and shows a country locked in one of the greatest battles of memory versus oblivion in human history.

Ann Johnson is a writer. Pulitzer Prize-winning researcher and senior fellow for China studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. In 2001, Johnson received a Pulitzer Prize for reporting on China, two awards from the Foreign Press Club, an award from the Society of Professional Journalists and Stanford University's Shorenstein Award for reporting on Asia.