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Three by Na Zhong
Not yet published
Expected 13 Oct 26An expansive yet personal story of a prideful teacher, her husband, their quietly rebellious daughter, and a town changed by the breakneck pressures of modernization After a long separation, a writer living in America reunites with her family in a small, industrial town in China. On her return, she looks back at her fraught relationship with her mother and finds herself telling her story from the beginning, going back as far as living memory will allow. As she chronicles her mother's life, she details the intimate moments they shared as they weathered fights, layoffs, and illnesses, and she unearths the forces that pressurized and combusted their echoes of distant wars and not-too-distant revolutions, tides of breakneck modernization, and the relentless erosion of time. For fans of Annie Ernaux’s The Years, Three is fable-like and precise, at once a sweeping view of an era and an elegy for a splintered family.
149 pages, Paperback
Expected publication October 13, 2026
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
ARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Three is a novella about family, generational divides and the complicated relationship between mothers and daughters. It centres around a daughter who emigrates to the USA against her mother’s wishes and subsequently becomes estranged from her family for years. The story begins with reconciliation before travelling back in time to explore her mother’s birth, her family history and the experiences that shaped both women.
This is an incredibly descriptive novella, but the writing can also feel strangely impersonal. The mother of the central character, for example, is consistently referred to simply as “the woman” rather than by name, which became difficult to follow when three or four women appeared within the same chapter. Other characters are often identified only by letters - Y, Z, N, etc. - and when someone reappeared after a long absence, I sometimes struggled to remember exactly where they fitted into the story. There is also very little dialogue; this is predominantly descriptive, reflective writing rather than a dialogue-driven narrative.
I did, however, love the cultural insight woven throughout. There are fascinating details about Chinese traditions and old wives’ tales, such as those surrounding the prevention of miscarriage, alongside things that were genuinely startling to me, including a young woman being considered an “old maid” at just 27.
Where Three really shines is in its exploration of generational trauma and the ways our upbringing follows us into adulthood. It examines the particular loneliness experienced by Chinese children growing up under the one-child policy, the obsessive teenage need to fit in, and how a highly competitive education system can lead someone to abandon their interests and gradually lose the parts of themselves that once represented freedom.
Most importantly, neither mother nor daughter is presented as entirely right or wrong. They are both flawed, imperfect people trying to find their way in the world, frequently misunderstanding one another’s intentions and allowing pride to stand between them. There is a beautiful and evocative humanness to that relationship, and the story feels deeply personal and lived-in.
One practical criticism of the ARC itself: the formatting was quite poor in places, with words either squashed together or incorrectly separated, which occasionally disrupted the reading experience.
Despite finding some of the stylistic choices distancing and confusing, I found Three a thoughtful, culturally rich and ultimately very human exploration of mothers, daughters and the experiences passed from one generation to the next.
Three is a novella about family, generational divides and the complicated relationship between mothers and daughters. It centres around a daughter who emigrates to the USA against her mother’s wishes and subsequently becomes estranged from her family for years. The story begins with reconciliation before travelling back in time to explore her mother’s birth, her family history and the experiences that shaped both women.
This is an incredibly descriptive novella, but the writing can also feel strangely impersonal. The mother of the central character, for example, is consistently referred to simply as “the woman” rather than by name, which became difficult to follow when three or four women appeared within the same chapter. Other characters are often identified only by letters - Y, Z, N, etc. - and when someone reappeared after a long absence, I sometimes struggled to remember exactly where they fitted into the story. There is also very little dialogue; this is predominantly descriptive, reflective writing rather than a dialogue-driven narrative.
I did, however, love the cultural insight woven throughout. There are fascinating details about Chinese traditions and old wives’ tales, such as those surrounding the prevention of miscarriage, alongside things that were genuinely startling to me, including a young woman being considered an “old maid” at just 27.
Where Three really shines is in its exploration of generational trauma and the ways our upbringing follows us into adulthood. It examines the particular loneliness experienced by Chinese children growing up under the one-child policy, the obsessive teenage need to fit in, and how a highly competitive education system can lead someone to abandon their interests and gradually lose the parts of themselves that once represented freedom.
Most importantly, neither mother nor daughter is presented as entirely right or wrong. They are both flawed, imperfect people trying to find their way in the world, frequently misunderstanding one another’s intentions and allowing pride to stand between them. There is a beautiful and evocative humanness to that relationship, and the story feels deeply personal and lived-in.
One practical criticism of the ARC itself: the formatting was quite poor in places, with words either squashed together or incorrectly separated, which occasionally disrupted the reading experience.
Despite finding some of the stylistic choices distancing and confusing, I found Three a thoughtful, culturally rich and ultimately very human exploration of mothers, daughters and the experiences passed from one generation to the next.
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
It is terrifying to think, to realize, that we are nothing but an accumulation of memories and pieces of a puzzle that are created as time advances, and that these pieces respond, almost and almost invariably, to those of our parents. Their pain and trauma, their sins and dreams, their frustrations, everything is woven inside our bodies and the decisions we take, the ideas and feelings we have. 'Three' is a novel that moves a profound fiber inside the reader, peaceful and slow; it has a calm that tightens the chest, it confronts us with what is sometimes too recognizable, too known, for it speaks about this relationship, this trauma that is inherited, this pain and this light that life has every day and is part of each human being.
Silence is present always, for characters lack names, but their stories are so present and so difficult, raw and vivid that they transform themselves into real bodies, real pulses of life that accompany the reader.
Na Zhong weaves about motherhood, about the challenges of being a human who is still processing her own pain and difficulties, suddenly in charge of caring for, loving, and defending a little being from pain, one to whom mothers inevitably cause very deep grief and suffering. The chaos of life, maternity, family ties, everything is painted with a beautiful and touching light in Na Zhong's words, and in this short yet powerful debut novel, the essence of life and sorrow, of light and shadows, is presented in a form so potent and delicate that it is for sure a text that touches the deepest part of you.
Silence is present always, for characters lack names, but their stories are so present and so difficult, raw and vivid that they transform themselves into real bodies, real pulses of life that accompany the reader.
Na Zhong weaves about motherhood, about the challenges of being a human who is still processing her own pain and difficulties, suddenly in charge of caring for, loving, and defending a little being from pain, one to whom mothers inevitably cause very deep grief and suffering. The chaos of life, maternity, family ties, everything is painted with a beautiful and touching light in Na Zhong's words, and in this short yet powerful debut novel, the essence of life and sorrow, of light and shadows, is presented in a form so potent and delicate that it is for sure a text that touches the deepest part of you.
Review of advance copy received from NetGalley
One story she tells only once
In Na Zhong’s Three, N recognises her parents across a street in her hometown. They are older. In her absence, they have made a life of their own.
N is the daughter. The novel names her father Y and calls her mother, a schoolteacher, the woman. After the opening reunion, it begins again with the woman’s childhood. It moves through three generations. Her story comes before her daughter’s. By the time the woman turns her grievances on N, their origins are on the page.
Review: https://www.notesonbooks.net/three-na...
The woman grows up in a household that shares its affection unequally. Her father favours her younger sister. When she wants to study art, her mother changes her university applications. The woman carries these injuries into adulthood and recounts them to N again and again. Each telling asks for sympathy.
One memory is different. https://www.notesonbooks.net/three-na...
In Na Zhong’s Three, N recognises her parents across a street in her hometown. They are older. In her absence, they have made a life of their own.
N is the daughter. The novel names her father Y and calls her mother, a schoolteacher, the woman. After the opening reunion, it begins again with the woman’s childhood. It moves through three generations. Her story comes before her daughter’s. By the time the woman turns her grievances on N, their origins are on the page.
Review: https://www.notesonbooks.net/three-na...
The woman grows up in a household that shares its affection unequally. Her father favours her younger sister. When she wants to study art, her mother changes her university applications. The woman carries these injuries into adulthood and recounts them to N again and again. Each telling asks for sympathy.
One memory is different. https://www.notesonbooks.net/three-na...
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
*I was given a copy by netgalley for review so thank you netgalley and joyland editions for the opportunity*
The description of the book said it was for fans of Annie Ernaux's work and that was the reason I wanted to read it. 'Three' by Na Zhong delivered exactly that. Mothers and daughters stories are my kryptonite and seeing it played out here, adding the layer of a multigenerational aspect to it, was truly the nail to the coffin, I binge read it in one sitting.
The choice of keeping the the characters's names hidden and calling them simply by letters and 'the woman' and 'the man' is a choice that diverted our attention to their lives instead of focusing more on the name. I would love to see the reason behind this choice.
The description of the book said it was for fans of Annie Ernaux's work and that was the reason I wanted to read it. 'Three' by Na Zhong delivered exactly that. Mothers and daughters stories are my kryptonite and seeing it played out here, adding the layer of a multigenerational aspect to it, was truly the nail to the coffin, I binge read it in one sitting.
The choice of keeping the the characters's names hidden and calling them simply by letters and 'the woman' and 'the man' is a choice that diverted our attention to their lives instead of focusing more on the name. I would love to see the reason behind this choice.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews