An engrossing new book that meticulously reports on a country in the throes of change ... What sets the story told in Private Revolutions apart, however, is the speed and magnitude of the upheaval, captured by Yang with palpable admiration for the women negotiating these seismic shifts one day at a time.
Yang, whose narratives are culled from interviews and diaries, represents these women honestly, but as a result, the writing can be flat ... Surprisingly, it is Yang’s straightforward prose that makes Private Revolutions a compelling read. Anecdotes, told without sentiment, veer from bleak to absurd ... Because Yang is disinclined to be melodramatic, her book rings true.
The riveting book that results from Yang’s persistence is a powerful snapshot of four young Chinese women attempting to assert control over the direction of their lives, escape the narrow confines of their patriarchal rural roots and make it in the big city ... Yang’s reportage offers up the raw human stories behind these colossal numbers ... The book’s ending remains unresolved, as the lives of Yang’s subjects continue to unfold.
Yuan Yang weaves together the stories of these four women with aplomb, mostly withholding explicit commentary, so that connections and insights emerge from the storylines organically, without the author telling you what to think. Some of the writing is striking ... A compelling snapshot of "Generation Involution".
Through these interlocking biographical sketches, Yang offers a fresh interpretation of the ongoing nature of China’s many upheavals, the actual effects of its oft-discussed policies, the cost of its meteoric economic growth, and the role a new generation of women is poised to play.
