My Rating: 4 stars
With her debut short story collection Land of Big Numbers, Te-Ping Chen brings us an insightful and thought-provoking portrayal of modern day China. Over the course of 10 diverse and layered stories, Chen provides keen insight into the cultural, political, economic, and social realities of what life is like for citizens in contemporary China and also beyond that, extending to the Chinese diaspora in several instances. A few of the stories were direct in depicting the plight of Chinese citizens' current reality, while others were more fantastical, employing elements of magical realism to get its point across — all of the stories were well-written though and compelling to read.
While I enjoyed the entire collection overall, a few of the stories were especially engaging, to the point that I couldn't help feeling disappointed when they ended abruptly, without closure. I prefer fictional stories that are complete — with a beginning, middle, and end — which is why, in general, I'm not particularly keen on short story collections. I don't like the feeling of being left hanging, though unfortunately, most short story collections do exactly that — this collection, of course, was no exception, though I will say that the quality of the stories does make up for it to some degree.
One of the things I really appreciate about this collection is that it gives readers a glimpse into what life is like for people living in contemporary China. This is significant given that many of the stories nowadays are about the Chinese immigrant experience in the U.S., which I'm happy to see of course, but I also feel that it's hard to truly understand that experience without having some familiarity with the background history and culture — books like this one are important and necessary contributions to this understanding.
This is a collection that I definitely recommend. At less than 250 pages, the book is brief enough that it can be read in one sitting, yet each story is so deeply nuanced that some amount of reflection is needed before moving on. As I mentioned earlier, while I did enjoy the entire collection, a few of the stories in particular stood out as favorites. Among them were:
"Lulu" - about brother/sister twins who grow up in the same household but end up taking radically different paths in life — one becomes a professional gamer while the other becomes a political activist. I felt this was the most emotionally nuanced story in the collection.
"Hotline Girl" - about a young woman who moves from the village to the city to work at a government call center and also to escape her violent ex-boyfriend, who eventually tracks her down.
"New Fruit" - about the effects of the qiguo on a village — a 'peculiar fruit' that evokes different, mostly positive, responses from those who eat it, until the day that it suddenly doesn't. This was an interesting story, one that demonstrated people's propensity toward fickleness but also their capacity for resilience.
"Field Notes on a Marriage" - about an interracial couple where the wife truly begins to understand her husband upon traveling to his home country after his death.
"Shanghai Murmur" - about the divide between the rich and poor, manifested in a young woman's obsession with an object belonging to one of her customers.
"Gubeikou Spirit" - about a group of people trapped on a subway platform for months, unable to leave until the government gives them permission to do so. This was by far the strangest story of the entire collection, but also the most fascinating and the one that stood out the most.
Received paper ARC from publisher (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt / Mariner Books).
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