A dog barked; a feral cat whined and another answered in a shriller voice; a child cried in a nearby house and a mother sang a lullaby; the world was a beautiful place under the spring sky, with the new moon surrounded by silver stars and a gentle breeze of the willow trees. Teacher Gu listened. His heart was a bottomless well; each small sound, a sigh and a whisper and the flapping of the most tender wings, was welcomed with deep-felt serenity.

This book is a devastating look at the crueller side of humanity and the ways in which anyone and everyone can fall victim to it. Set three years after the death of Chairman Mao, we begin with the day that a counterrevolutionary is set to be killed - the catalyst for the events that follow - and, from that moment on, we meet a variety of characters, each of whom is somehow connected to her. We follow her parents, who are struggling to grieve for a daughter without appearing to condone or approve of her actions, a young girl who is shunned by her own family due to her deformities, a young boy who was given away to his grandparents at birth and has only just returned to his parents, an elderly couple who used to take in abandoned baby girls, a young man who is obsessed with women, and a woman who is the the town's news announcer due to her beautiful speaking voice.

In spite of having a lot of characters, The Vagrants never feels like it is brimming over or that Yiyun Li doesn't have time to do them all justice - in fact, I would say this is one of her strengths and worked marvellously with the story she was trying to tell. There is a bleak tone to the work, and it can be unflinchingly brutal with acts of violence towards humans and animals alike. It can be quite hard to stomach at times and, while I think this could act as a deterrent to some readers, I think it does a topic like this justice and couldn't have been done successfully otherwise. Li never tries to inject optimism or even beauty in places where they just don't belong...they are there but they feel earned and realistic. It can be an uncomfortable read, too, especially in the case of the character Bashi, the young man who is obsessed with women. Reading his sections, especially at the beginning of the book, had my stomach turning and while Li never really gives him a redemption arc, you can't help but feel sympathy for him as you read the book and learn more about him.

Another aspect of this book that I absolutely loved was Li's depiction of the executed woman, Gu Shang. It would've been so easy for Li to have painted her in an angelic light in an effort to manipulate the readers to feel nothing but sympathy for her. In fact, Li depicts Shang as a complex, flawed character, someone who also acted with violence and committed terrible acts against other citizens to make a political point. Yes she is a victim, but she was also a perpetrator, and Li handled this brilliantly.

I don't think this book will be for everyone. Li doesn't present any clear answers; she doesn't resolve these issues neatly with a pretty bow on top - she leaves a lot up to the readers, making you work out things for yourself and reflect on what happened rather than explicitly telling you, and that could put people off but, for me, it worked perfectly. It's not an easy read but absolutely worth it.