The piece in the New York Times Book Review, penned by Cao Guanlong, a well-known Chinese author living in New York, states that Cheng, by calling attention to "mutations" and "abnormalities," depicts characters burdened by the history of an island that "inherited a 5,000-year-old feudal culture and, more recently, suffered under another 50 years of Japanese colonial occupation."
刊登在「紐約時報」由紐約知名中國作家曹冠龍執筆的書評指出：「鄭清文在這本小說集裡用嶄新的手法，揭露台灣人背負五千年中國封建文化，及五十年日本殖民經驗等複雜歷史背景所呈現的陰鬱人性。」