An elegant, somewhat aloof rumination ... Written in unembellished, detached prose that is as involved with itself and its imprecision ... Li writes about her preternaturally gifted sons as though they were no different from other children; they clearly were, given to witty ripostes and metaphysical asides ... Inculcated by her in a certain attitude of ambivalence—or, to put it another way, in a tenuousness about entering the fray—they were acutely aware of the likely failure of life to live up to its billing as an inherently meaningful affair and of the fragile nature of the whole earthbound enterprise ... Still, none of these speculations about their respective temperaments explains why the boys, seemingly deeply loved and flourishing, decided to opt out so early on ... There is no simple toting up of all the factors and arriving at a satisfactory explanation ... A commemoration of her sons’ brief lives, an elliptical documentation of their vivid, singular presences before they disappeared ... Disturbing, inconsolable tribute, a memoir unlike others, strange and profound and fiercely determined not to look away.
The volume is full of the boys’ presence as Li crafts an ethereal memorial ... Lack of a precise descriptor does not prevent Li from beautifully narrating her nonlinear, never-ending odyssey of pain ... A mother, she writes, cannot keep a child alive. In writing like Li’s, however, even absent children can live on.
