This book is a collection of short stories about beasts that live alongside humans in a fictional Chinese city. Each story has a similar structure, describing the individual beasts at first ("apart from that, they look exactly like humans") then the main character finding something out about them, and a big or small twist at the end. The overarching story tells a deeper tale about the world and is almost a fable about humanity.

Most of the stories are gruesome or heart wrenching in one way or another, and while the flippant and poignant writing style invites to rush through the book, I took my time and read no more than one story per day to digest what I've read.

I thoroughly enjoyed these extraordinary stories about the beasts, and while sometimes convoluted, the overall plot made sense to me and added an extra layer to the already great individual stories.