"[A] multilayered masterpiece." --The San Francisco Chronicle
"Beautiful. . . . Spectacularly scenic. . . . Impressive. . . . The euphonious sounds of the prose, together with the sensory impressions they unleash, reinforce the book's message that language can offer mesmerizing pleasures." --
The New York Times Book Review "Enchant[ing]. . . . Elegantly translated. . . . An intricate and affecting legend of love, loss, and intellectual obsession." --
The Boston Globe "An exquisitely structured, dreamlike tale of strange and noble quests, not to mention love, that roams across centuries and touches down in China, Burma, Mali and Paris." --
Kansas City Star, Best 100 Books of the Year
"Haunting and complex. . . . Told with a spare elegance of prose. . . . Abounds in inventive mythology darkly threaded by a tragic love story." --
The Washington Times "A freewheeling meditation on language as the divine current that buoys human experience. . . . As a piece of art, encrusted with meaning and mystery, it is rich and strange." --
The Los Angeles Times "Much of this wonderfully written book is set against the colorful backdrop of Old Peking and the crisply written narrative is as exciting and powerful as a typhoon." --
Tuscon Citizen "At its heart the novel crafts an ode to the power of language." --
National Geographic Traveler "[This] complex and well written historical novel . . . grips the audience thoroughly with its poetic look back in time." --
Mainstream Fiction "Mesmerizing." --
Audrey Magazine
"Elegant and thoughtful. . . . Worthwhile and captivating with a beautiful ending sure to resonate with its audience. . . . A celebration of the joy of a good story. [Dai] Sijie delights in storytelling." --Bookreporter.com
"Filled with twists and turn of fate, back stories, symbolism and intersections of politics and religion worthy of a Dan Brown novel. . . . Dai adds layer upon layer of meaning. . . . [
Once Upon a Moonless Night] pulls the reader along, as does the language, which is pungent and immediate. And as for the scroll itself: this is one mystery, one message, that really makes it worth reading until the last lines of a novel to discover." --
UPI Asia "
Once on a Moonless Night is full of tales within tales and worlds within worlds, ranging from ancient Chinese empires through communist China to modern Beijing." --A. S. Byatt,
The Guardian [UK]
"[Dai] Sijie's ambitious work spans a thousand years of Chinese history. . . . [with] a rich repository of tales, traditions and sensibilities [the book's] theme of indeterminacy of meaning is braided into the clash between East and West. . . . [Dai] Sijie has a gift for the spectacular."
--Times Literary Supplement [UK]
"
Once on a Moonless Night evokes the past with all the eerie clarity of a dream, its outlines blurred, but every tiny, telling detail extraordinarily alive. Anyone in search of a brief history of China would do well to begin right here."
--Financial Times [UK]
"[Dai] Sijie's breathtaking story shows the beauty and horrors that make up China's history while the poetry of [Dai] Sijie's words is revealed in Hunter's magnificent translation. It's fitting that a story of a love affair with language should be written so beautifully."
--Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"[B]ewitching. . . . As impressionistically historical as it is imaginative, Dai's dreamlike tale of epic quests and love put to the test is exquisitely structured. . . . Dai's dazzling and magical saga intimates that language is transcendent; books are precious; translation is a noble art; stories are the key to freedom; and truth prevails."
--Booklist (starred review)
