This story I found harder to get into it.This book is set at a re-education camp during the Great Leap Forward. It's a period of history that I know essentially nothing about, so it made for fascinating reading.
The premise of the book is clever - the narrative chops and changes between three different "books" (the fourth book referred to in the title appears almost as an epilogue), each with a very different purpose. One is The Author writing a novel based on his experiences at the camp. One is the Author writing what's almost a religious story about The Child, the innocent despot who runs their camp. And one is the Author reporting to The Child and the higher ups on the actions of his former prisoners. However, at times I found it hard to discern enough difference among the four narratives.
In the middle the story took a bizarre turn which really drew me in where the Author goes off on his own to plan crops, and suddenly the crops are growing like crazy because he's feeding them his own blood. So that was bizarre, but clearly a metaphor for the Great Leap Forward and how it was ultimately a disaster. Then the book focuses on the great famine and how ultimately the residents of this camp start to die of starvation, leaving those still alive to contemplate just how hungry they have to be before they resort to cannibalism.
None of the characters have actual names, they are called by the profession that landed them in this no mans land.
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