If Yan’s memoir owes its existence to family, it is because every blessing in Yan’s life owed its existence to family, as Yan’s unflinching self-examination demonstrates plainly.

... delicately translated.

After decades of glimpsing autobiographical hints in his always intriguing, often surreal novels and short stories, Anglophone audiences get access to Yan Lianke's real life.

... an elegiac homage to the people and places no longer present for Yan.

... [a] vivid and faithful translation.

The harshness of life described in Three Brothers is frequently unbearable.

A leading Chinese novelist tells the story of his family’s hardscrabble life with surprising tenderness.

Throughout the book, Yan depicts his provincial relatives with enormous heart and respect, acknowledging their sacrifices in a dark yet poignant meditation on grief and death.

... loving, episodic.