Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Characters occupy a haunting world of ambivalence and moral decay in Mu's English language debut, a collection about people unmoored by the changes that took place in 20th-century China. The author elides most of the horrors of WWII and the Cultural Revolution ("without getting into too much detail, what followed was a long, dark period of feeling neither dead nor alive"), but the psychological scars left by both lie at the heart of these stories: people are murdered, sent to labor on farms, and imprisoned for "decadent thoughts," offering context for the small but lacerating sorrows at the forefront of each story. A small boy loses a cherished object in "The Moment Childhood Vanished," an event that is both trivial and darkly ominous. Petty slights lead to shocking violence in "Eighteen Passengers on a Bus." Perhaps the most telling work is "Fong Fong No. 4," in which a young girl reinvents herself to suit the whims of history, becoming an intellectual, then a farm laborer, then a businesswoman, in the process shedding her identity, her sentimentality, and, finally, some of her humanity. These stories have an exquisite, crystalline quality ably captured by Liu's flawless translation. (May) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
With 20-plus books published in Taiwan and China, writer/painter Mu finally makes his English debut with a collection of 13 stories he chose from three previous titles. The result is, in a word, uneven. Standouts outshine the less than memorable, perhaps making the latter seem that much more lackluster in comparison. "The Moment When Childhood Vanished" is a koanlike reminder of bewildering loss, "Xia Mingzhu: A Bright Pearl" challenges family bonds, "Eighteen Passengers on a Bus" shockingly pushes the boundaries of patience, and "Halo" captures the holy in humanity. The highlight is "Fong Fong No. 4," which, in a few controlled pages, translates half a century of China's tumultuous, wrenching past through the protagonist's metamorphosis (in four phases) from girlhood to middle-aged womanhood. -VERDICT Although recent notable collections such as Ha Jin's A Good Fall, Paul Yoon's Once the Shore, and Daniyal Mueenuddin's In Other Rooms, Other Wonders might prove more consistent, readers who appreciate spare, elliptical stories that last long after the final page will find considerable satisfaction here.-Terry Hong, -Smithsonian BookDragon, Washington, DC (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
