Summary

The novel is told in first-person past by the narrator, who is a writer that focuses on telling stories about the beasts that live in her city, Yong’an. Each chapter in the book focuses on a different beast. In “Sorrowful Beasts,” the narrator introduces the sorrowful beasts. The females were incredibly beautiful and are often married to wealthy human men. Male beasts were thought to be incapable of mating with human women. The beasts never smiled because smiling would kill them. They only smiled when experiencing extreme grief.

The narrator’s friend, Lefty, called and told her the story of a sorrowful beast, Cloud. Lefty said she had met Cloud at the Dolphin Bar and had taken him home and tamed him the previous May. Lefty told the narrator that last week Cloud’s sister, Rain, had come over...