Yiyun Li grew up in Beijing and moved to the US in 1996. This is her first collection of short stories, many of which concern the meeting of those two great cultural rivers — the communist China of her childhood and the capitalist West. In After a Life, two elderly men are fascinated by the stock market. In Immortality, a young man grows up under the strange protection of looking like “the dictator”. Yi’s writing is beautifully spare and controlled. She shows how lives and personalities are shaped by historical change — in intimate ways not recorded in history books.

LINGER AWHILE
by Russell Hoban
Bloomsbury, £10.99

This writer has an unstoppable imagination. Hoban’s eccentric storytelling for both children (The Mouse and his Child) and adults (Turtle Diary) has won him a devoted following. Linger Awhile concerns an old man who falls in love with a film actress. Unfortunately, the B-movie goddess has been dead for 47 years. But that is merely a setback. He happens to have a friend who is a mad boffin. The techno-wizard manages to bring the goddess back to life in the present day. A glorious cocktail of 1950s westerns, vampires (oh yes) and several murders.

SNOW FLOWER AND THE SECRET FAN
by Lisa See
Bloomsbury, £10.99

Lily is the daughter of a farmer in early 19th-century China. At the age of 6, she learns that she has a special gift — her feet. They have the potential to be bound into a state of tiny perfection, and this will be her passport to a good marriage. In feudal China women are treated like cattle, and the agony of foot-binding begins a life defined by suffering. Lily has one refuge — a special friend, Snow Flower, with whom she exchanges secret letters in nu shu, the writing known only to women. Ladies, buy two copies of this wonderful book, and give one to your dearest friend.

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