A review by ktrain3900
Love in the New Millennium by Can Xue

adventurous challenging mysterious slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

While in many cases, you skip the introductory material, here you want to read Eileen Myles' forward so you know what you're in for: a dreamworld. The book moves with the logic of dreams, which is to say a logic that makes little to no sense when you're awake, and to read you have to be awake. Somehow this book managed to be both intriguing and tedious, snail-paced and rushing headlong. There were times I was both so bored and lost I felt inclined to give up yet I couldn't. As the reader you're bewitched in a way. Is the book the history of the mill Uncle Hong was compiling? Is the new millennium the afterlife, and everyone is dead, in a labyrinthine, dreamlike purgatory? Like life, like love, it remains a mystery. 
Expand filter menu Content Warnings