Looking for Tank Man

by Ha Jin

A Harvard student from China discovers the fraught, hidden history of the Tiananmen Square massacre in this powerful novel of protest and suppression from the National Book Award–winning author.

When the Chinese premier visits Harvard, international student Pei Lulu encounters a lone woman protesting who will drastically change her understanding of the People's Republic and her own place in the world. For the first time, Lulu learns of the 1989 protest movement and the government’s violent response. Determined to find out more, she seeks answers from her family, who share surprising stories of their involvement, and from a formative university course based on powerful firsthand accounts.

At once a compelling coming-of-age tale and a poignant tribute to the courage of activists, Looking for Tank Man keeps this tragedy alive in the public memory and warns against the dangers of authoritarian regimes.

Genres: Fiction, China, Historical Fiction, Asia, Contemporary, Asian Literature, Literary Fiction

368 pages, Paperback

Published October 21, 2025

About the author

Ha Jin is the pen name of Jin Xuefei, a novelist, poet, short story writer, and Professor of English at Boston University.Ha Jin writes in English about China, a political decision post-Tiananmen Square.

Ha Jin grew up in mainland China and served in the People’s Liberation Army in his teens for five years. After leaving the army, he worked for three years at a railroad company in a remote northeastern city, Jiamusi, and then went to college in Harbin, majoring in English. He has published in English ten novels, four story collections, four volumes of poetry, a book of essays, and a biography of Li Bai. His novel Waiting won the National Book Award for Fiction, the PEN/Faulkner Award, and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Ha Jin is William Fairfield Warren Distinguished Professor in English and Creative Writing at Boston University, and he has been elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. His writing has been translated into more than thirty languages. Ha Jin’s novel The Woman Back from Moscow was published by Other Press in 2023.

Reviews

[Miss✧Pickypants ᓚᘏᗢ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thoroughly enjoyed everything about this book, the story, the writing and the historical information. This unusual coming-of age story tells the tale of Pei Lulu as she navigates her life as a female Chinese student in the U.S. in 2008. She first learns of the 1989 Tiananmen Massacre and Tank Man while attending Harvard and is shocked that the Chinese government actively suppresses information about this event. When she discovers her parents were involved in the protest movement resulting in the Massacre she becomes intrigued and decides to pursue a Ph.D. at Columbia with this as her thesis topic.

Like Lulu and the students at the start of the book, I knew nothing about the Massacre of hundreds to thousands of peaceful protesters (accounts vary, Chinese government says hundreds, other say up to 10,000). Also did not know about Tank Man, an iconic photo of a man standing in front of a column of tanks. Even today the identity of this man remains unknown. Recommend this for both the well-written story and the light it shines on a tragic event to prevent its erasure.

[Roger DeBlanck · Rating 5 out of 5]

For over thirty years Ha Jin has been using his voice through literature to expose the inhumanity of the Chinese Communist Party. His most recent novel Looking for Tank Man (2025) is a memorable academic thriller that confronts China’s systematic attempts to erase the Tiananmen Square massacre from public consciousness.

Similar to how Ha Jin himself studied abroad in America and later defected from China and became a US citizen, his protagonist Pei Lulu is an international student studying history at Harvard in 2008. Soon thereafter she learns for the first time of the violence carried out by the People’s Liberation Army against students protesting for reform in Tiananmen Square in 1989. Such a shocking revelation leads Lulu on a mission to investigate the tragedy and pursue a PhD focused on the iconic “Tank Man” who dared to sacrifice his life and halt a line of tanks headed to Beijing to suppress what the Communist Party leaders falsely declared was a violent insurrection trying to overthrow the government.

Lulu’s research uncovers secrets about the involvement of her own parents in the Tiananmen protests while she also tries piecing together a conclusion about Tank Man. Was he a student protestor whose act of defiance was accidently caught on camera? Or did the Communist Party leaders stage the event to propagandize their narrative that no violence was used to end the student protests? Ultimately, whatever happened to Tank Man? Was he punished, or is he still alive and forced by the government to keep his identity concealed?

The fact is that Tank Man remains a mystery, even as his iconic image took on a life of its own, and he continues to resonate decades later as a universal symbol of resistance and freedom. Through the awakening of Lulu and her research, Ha Jin offers glimpses into the maniacal policies implemented by the People’s Republic to erase Tank Man and the Tiananmen Square massacre from the memory of China’s citizenry.

Lulu’s story blends her own personal struggles as an immigrant in America with the high stakes challenges of academic rigor to uncover new truths about history. Ha Jin’s smooth and engaging prose flies off the page with its clarity to tackle big ideas, and in scenes of grave tension he shows how the function of totalitarian regimes is almost comical if their practices weren’t so terrorizing.

Looking for Tank Man kept me riveted to Lulu’s search for truth and to the courage of so many Chinese dissidents and activists resisting the tyranny of their motherland. Even though the novel’s ending comes off somewhat anticlimactic, its totality makes obvious the parallels Ha Jin paints between what the Chinese Communist Party has tried to do with rewriting the history of the Tiananmen massacre and what Trump has done to sanitize his fomenting of violent insurrectionists who attacked the Capitol on January 6, 2021 in his attempts to retain unlawful power.

[可欣 · Rating 4 out of 5]

a strange book where, in the beginning i was frustrated because there's no real exigence in the traditional sense, that the plot just seems to be a regular chinese student going through an american education. i felt a bit bored, because the prose felt flat and the characters not compelling, but as i stuck with it, i realized that the exigence/urgency in the present is constantly informed by the past, and in this case, efforts to erase the past. there are a lot of important things about china's socio-political landscape, its study in academia, and the people who study it or live it that ha jin doesn't miss: the white boy obsessed with the tank man figure, the rich chinese students who are china's main defenders against the west, the abuse of power a phd advisor has over his student, and at its center, the nuance in origin, dissemination, impact of tank man as a cultural icon. it's strange to see your life, your ideas about your country and the country you have left it for reflected so intimately in a book.

[tropie · Rating 3 out of 5]

i found the writing style somewhat dull in this - we talk a lot about the modern move in lit toward "cinematic" writing and away from analytic/reflective but this had so little description it felt even more removed. extremely dry. i liked many of the characters, or at least found them interesting enough to finish the book, but the entire exercise felt really abrupt.

[Biena Magbitang · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my first five-star read of the year.

At its core, Looking for Tank Man is a coming-of-age story. But not the soft, romantic kind. It is about growing up and slowly realizing that the version of history you inherited might be incomplete. Or intentionally thinned out.

The novel follows Pei Lulu, a Harvard student from China who begins the story unsure whether the Tiananmen Square massacre even happened. That detail alone says everything about the power of erasure. You do not need to deny history loudly. You just make people uncertain.

The turning point comes when Lulu goes home and learns that her own mother joined the 1989 hunger strike. Through her mother’s diary, history becomes personal. Not political theory. Not headlines. Just a young woman writing about fear, hunger, hope. Even then, there is doubt. What is fact? What is memory? What has been reshaped over time? Ha Jin never makes it fully clear. And that feels deliberate. Erasure is rarely clean. It leaves fragments.

Reading this during the 40th anniversary of EDSA People Power made it hit differently. We just marked four decades since Filipinos stood in the streets to defend democracy. And yet even here, narratives shift. Textbooks change. Social media reframes. The fight over memory never really ends. Lulu’s search for Tiananmen began to feel uncomfortably close to home.

I also found Lulu’s inner voice oddly comforting. She overthinks. She fixates. She questions herself constantly. Her obsession with the Tank Man image feels less like hero worship and more like someone trying to anchor herself to something solid.

Some parts of the book are repetitive. Some plot turns are easy to predict. But Ha Jin’s writing is simple and steady, and that restraint works. There is no grandstanding. Just clear prose that trusts the reader.
Even the final resolution, when she finally manages to “look for” Tank Man, feels a little corny on paper. But emotionally, it lands. Because the search was never really about finding one man. It was about deciding what to believe. About choosing to confront doubt instead of living comfortably inside it.

This is a novel about growing up. But it is also about how power shapes memory, and how fragile truth can be when history itself is contested.

[Jennifer (formerly Eccentric Muse)]

Somewhere inside this book -- told from the POV of a Chinese student completing her Ph.D. at Columbia -- is a fascinating perspective on the suppression, within China, of the Tiananmen Square massacre. Unfortunately, Looking for Tank Man fails as a novel on just about every count: its flat, affectless writing, its wooden dialogue, its lack of any kind of meaningful characterization, and the bizarre choices Ha Jin made to give equal weight to the most mundane details of the protagonist's life (poorly described) and the shocking reporting of the atrocities and oppression of the Chinese regime (the only time the prose came to life).

*sigh*

[Bookworm · Rating 1 out of 5]

Middle aged male author writes a fictional hot personality-less young woman who loves sleeping with middle aged male authors

[Emma · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed it in a way that was informative. This is my first time reading a Ha Jin book. Because of the nature of the subject, I’ve always had a slight hesitation to learn more about it.

But I found myself googling as I read even though I felt little attachment to the character LuLu despite her role as the protagonist.

I also thought the sex scenes came out of nowhere. Understandable almost…but what?

[Kristi · Rating 4 out of 5]

I fell in love with Ha Jin as an author, not as a professor, in 1999 with the book "Waiting". the story of Lin Kong, a man living in two worlds, struggling with the conflicting claims of two utterly different women as he moves through the political minefields of a society designed to regulate his every move and stifle the promptings of his innermost heart. I was not the only human to admire this book as it won the National Book Award for Fiction, the PEN/Faulkner Award, and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Not bad for a first fiction book. Add to that: A Free Life - 1990's America. We follow the Wu family--father Nan, mother Pingping, and son Taotao--as they fully sever their ties with China in the aftermath of the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre and begin a new, free life in the United States. Ha Jin grewup in mainland China and served in the People’s Liberation Army in his teens for five years. After leaving the army, he worked for three years at a railroad company in a remote northeastern city, Jiamusi, and then went to college in Harbin, majoring in English. . He was on a scholarship at Brandeis University when the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre occurred. The Chinese government's forcible crackdown hastened his decision to emigrate to the United States, and was the cause of his choice to write in English "to preserve the integrity of his work." I believe that he speaks the truth about China and the Tiananmen massacre... Before my review, I wish to explain my interest in Asia. In 1967 on the way to study at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok for 4 months as part of a program through St. Olaf College in Northfield, MN. On the way we stopped in Japan and Hong Kong. The way home included Penang, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Taiwan, the Philippines, Guam, and Hong Kong a second time. I turned 19 that year, Ha Jim would have been 11 and the son of a mulitary officer.... In 1967 Americans were not allowed to travel to mainland China or bring any products that might be Chinese out of Hong Kong. If you purchased jade or ivory, you received a certificate that stated "not from China"... Right!! We got to see a bit of old China in the New Territories. People think of Hong Kong as an island - technically correct, but the colonly included Kowloon and land extending north up to the border. The total area of Hong Kong is approximately 430 square miles. The New Territories alone cover about 380 square miles, making up a significant portion of the total area. We could see guards with weapons across the Shenzhen River. We visited a marvelous ancient walled city. We, of course, wanted to take photos, but the women ran from us and the guide explained that they believed that a captured image stole their souls. The temples in Taiwan were amazing and of course, National Palace Museum: Located in Shilin, this museum claims to house the world's largest collection of Chinese artifacts, with nearly 700,000 items spanning over 8,000 years of history. China was the main source of potable water to Hong Kong in the 1960's. There was a severe crisis in 1963–64 when water was supplied only once every four days. We were told not to leave the hotel after dark: The 1967 unrest in Hong Kong was a significant event that marked a turning point in the colony's history. It began as a minor labor dispute and escalated into a major crisis that prompted the British to consider evacuation from the territory. The riots were partially inspired by successful anti-colonial demonstrations in Portuguese Macau and were fueled by leftist views and sympathies toward the Chinese Communist Party. The protests resulted in 51 deaths, 15 deaths in bomb attacks, 832 injuries, and 4,979 arrests. The unrest galvanized the colonial administration into enacting numerous policies and programs to address legitimate grievances among Hong Kong's often exploited and abused workers. The riots also served to define Hong Kong as a separate entity from China, with many residents rejecting the mainland's offer of greater opportunities under a foreign flag. We did not witness violence, but water for drinking and showers was unpredictable. This is why it was so important for Hong Kong to build desalination plants and reservoirs to make the area less dependent upon China. ( God looks after fools and children - we were both and went anywhere any time.) The area was a colony until July 1, 1997. I am not a fan of colonialism in any form, but I was sad when China began limiting many freedoms that Hong Kong enjoyed despite being "owned" by Great Britain... In addition to becoming a lifelong student of Asia, I also became an lover of good Chinese food, especially Dim Sum. I still have a copy of Mao's little red book. As a WWII history addict, I find it sad that China who was on the side of the Allies, saved the pilots of the Doolittle Raid, and lost millions of lives ( along with the Soviet Union ) to the war is no longer a country that support independence. There are photographs that stay in the brain and can never be erased: The "napalm girl" a naked 9-year- old burned Vietnamese child fleeing from American bombing, Emmett Till, 1955, Saigon Execution, 1968, JFK Assassination, Frame 313, 1963, Kent State Shootings, 1970, 1968 Olympics Black Power Salute, a man falling from the World Trade Center.......... Sadly most of these powerful photos are devastating.... Tank man was amazing for the courage of one young Chinese man in front of an armored battalion..... I, like everyone who reads this book, wanted to hear the truth of the Tiananmen Square massacre. I think we did, but I was disappointed by the means of telling us. I wanted less of the struggles of a young Chinese student with study in the United States and predatory men, and more, more, more about Tank Man. Ha Jin presents a theory that the event was staged by the Chinese government to show how magnanimous the military was in not killing this brave young man.... I do not believe this is the case ( nor do I believe that Ha Jin believes the tale ). If it were, the narrative could still be used by China to paint a positive picture. They would not be hiding information. To the best of my knowledge, the world has never learned the name of the tank driver or the brave young man. The tank driver clearly saw tank man as did other protestors in the square. A London paper provided a name, but it was "refuted" by the Chinese. The Chinese attempted to take the photo out of circulation. I believed the first hand accounts provided by Pei Lulu's parents. I had no idea there was a statue called Goddess of Democracy erected in the square. (Check it out) I believe that Ha Jin's choice to never write in Chinese about China after the massacre tells us what he believes about the attempt for democracy in 1989. I hope that young man is alive and free!!!!!! I hope that people have protected and cherished him!!!!! We need a tank man in America right now. Kristi & Abby Tabby

[Emily Pink · Rating 4 out of 5]

Looking For Tank Man

It’s taken me a few days to compose my thoughts on Looking For Tank Man, mainly because the subject matter loomed large over me. The novel follows Lulu, a Chinese academic completing her studies at Harvard and, later, Colombia. Her interests lie in the controversy of the Tiananmen Square Massacre of 1989, particularly in Tank Man – an icon of the socio-political moment and a hugely contested figure. Looking for Tank Man articulates the power and danger of protest, especially in a space of surveillance and censorship.

I really enjoyed the academic perspective of the novel, particularly in how Lulu reckoned with her personal connections to Tiananmen and her understanding of her US citizenship. That being said, I think too often the story shifted into an essay, too closely mimicking the academic prose of a dissertation and disregarding plot and pacing.

I was particularly interested in how Ha Jin presented the Chinese government – providing subtle interjections and close calls with them, without explicitly providing us with an inside perspective. Lulu has numerous interactions with the regime without being allowed in to the inner workings of government – mirroring Tank Man’s ambiguity and leaving her and her fellow students to piece together what was real and what was smoke and mirrors.

A huge thank you to the Other Press team for sending me a proof in exchange for an honest review.

[Audrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

The peaceful student protests at Tiananmen Square and the Chinese government's violent reaction, is indelible in my brain. And, the erasure of history and the general Chinese population's lack of knowledge is a portent to what is currently happening in the US. Lulu is a Chinese student at Harvard and has no idea what happened before she was born. She soon decides to educate herself, sending her on a course of subtle activism about Tiananmen Square. And she becomes fascinated with Tank Man, which may or may not have been a staged event. This coming of age isn't just her going through college but about interrogating history and ignorance as well as learning about her parents' past and involvement with the student movement.

I received an arc from the publisher but all opinions are my own.

[Dmitri · Rating 3 out of 5]

‘Before returning to Boston, I asked my mother about her involvement with the student movement. She dodged most of my questions, but I kept asking. She admitted that she, an anthropology major at Beijing University at the time, had been silly and taken part in some demonstrations without knowing their true intentions or the consequences of her participation.’

‘I got impatient and demanded, “Didn’t you take part in the hunger strike?” “Yes, I was with them briefly. Then your grandpa came and dragged me away.”“Did you believe in freedom and equality and democracy?” “Of course I did, but what the students demanded wasn’t feasible at the time.’

“Lulu, please don’t bother looking into this. Concentrate on your schoolwork. It’s not easy to scrape together the money for your education. You must cherish the opportunity of studying abroad.”

************
Chinese expat Ha Jin lives and teaches at Boston University. He was a former soldier in China’s People’s Liberation Army and an American Literature scholarship student at Brandeis when the Tiananmen Square protests and massacre occurred in 1989. He signed a petition for democratic change and has lived in exile in the US ever since. With his passport revoked by China and visa applications rejected he has had no ability to return. I wish him luck here with the US current hysteria over immigration and biases against political asylum.

The novel has parallels in its plot to Ha Jin’s personal life. In 2008 a Harvard student learns of her mother’s involvement in the 1989 Tiananmen uprising, rarely taught in China. The death toll is estimated over 1000 by Amnesty International, 2500 by Red Cross. We may soon be seeing a similar abuse of authoritarian power in America. The title is from a famous photograph of an unidentified man who stood before the column of T59 tanks after the massacre, televised live from balconies of international hotels overlooking the square.

This is one of ten Ha Jin novels on China. It is stark in its language and style, stripped of literary ornament and colloquial dialogue. Probably his most famous book was ‘Waiting’, a Pulitzer Prize finalist, the 1999 PEN/Faulkner Award and National Book Award winner. The protagonist Lulu is from a middle class family who pays for her tuition with a scholarship, part time work and gets help from her divorced parents. She had never heard of the uprising, and questioning its truth she enrolls in an elective course.

Her professor Dr. Hong immigrated to Canada and studied the subject in great depth. There are some echoes of the American born historian Iris Chang, who documented the WWII massacre of Chinese civilians by the Japanese Imperial Army in 1997’s ‘The Rape of Nanjing’. Many non-fictional characters such as Wang Dan, exiled Tiananmen leaders and victims who were run over by tanks appear in the story. It is debated if the iconic image of the Tank Man was staged to show army restraint by his stopping tanks in their tracks.

It is probable that Ha Jin’s position as a well known author and an exile has given him personal access to many of the Tiananmen protesters and dissidents. It is also easy to suspect he is not impartial observer of the massacre. There is an underlying thread of criticism of the government cover up and its refusal to allow discussion of the events to this day. This is understandable and yet at times the student Lulu, her mother and the professor Dr. Hong seem too simplistic and two dimensional as the leading characters of the novel.

Lulu is a stereotypical Chinese exchange student, startled by the loose morals and lack of discipline in her American peers, while Hong is a caricature of the civil rights ideologue thought to be found on liberal college campuses. A more interesting story would include a conflicted or contradictory protagonist, or at least one that explores what was going on in the minds of the tank commanders and soldiers. I began to lose my patience with these facile historians, unconvinced of their ability to discern fact from political propaganda.

As in the US Kent State protests of 1968, the Korean Gwangju Uprising in 1980, and Trump/ICE demonstrations in 2026, soldiers began to fire at civilians with live ammunition, on orders of officers and ultimately their political leaders. So much for singing The Internationale or We Shall Overcome; when rifles rain bullets the only thing left to do is run. The book names army commanders who didn’t follow orders to use live rounds. Some lingered in the rear, some fired in the air, but there were enough willing to use deadly force.

Although this book takes place in 2008 it is grounded in 1989 when Ha Jin was exiled. Current events enter the story only in passing, such as the development of video surveillance which spread rapidly after 2010 under president Xi. It treats the uprising as unheard of by students, which may have been true in the 80’s but certainly isn’t with post millennial youth. Internet and social media, while diligently censored, ended the low information age. There, like here, state made disinformation significantly influences public opinion.

Lulu’s parents are presented as authentic Chinese voices, her mother mainly concerned with finding her a husband and her return to China, her father a free thinking artist who is remarried, with a second wife and young twins. Ha Jin’s decision to tell the story from a female perspective is more problematic. Lulu appears oddly androgynous and stilted as a character. One wonders why this gender defying leap was attempted. Through all of this Ha Jin retains a resentment of the homeland which expelled him for merely criticizing it.

Lulu returns home for the summer between graduation and beginning a history PhD at Columbia. She finds out more about her parents role in the demonstrations from a diary her mother kept during the hunger strike. Her father helped design and build the Goddess of Democracy sculpture at the center of the square. The strike coincided with a Gorbachev visit, which further provoked the Communist Party, and in particular Deng Xiaoping. Both leaders had been hailed by Ronald Reagan for opening up their countries to capitalism.

Turmoil in Tiananmen spread to other cities and happened during the collapse of the Soviet Union, a world changing upheaval that the CCP intended to avoid. Martial law was declared, the square was cordoned off, radio and television stations secured. As the army closed in more than a million workers converged to join the students. Beijing ground to a standstill. Protests began worldwide, particularly in Hong Kong and Tapei where millions turned out. Lulu’s mother and Beijing students started to leave before the final rout.

A scapegoat needed, Zhao Ziyang was dismissed as party secretary, placed under house arrest and replaced by Jiang Zemin. Li Peng was put in charge of mop up operations. As Tsinghua students thinned out, protesters continued to pour in from the provinces. Fang Lizhi, China’s answer to Andrei Sakharov, was a astrophysicist and professor who developed China's atomic bomb. He gave speeches to students in 1989 and was given asylum at the US embassy in Beijing. Sadly the fictional characters aren’t the equals of the actual ones.

During her summer stay in China Lulu decides to do research with eyewitnesses of the uprising. She gets in touch with a former soldier who shares his experience. After the meeting she is picked up by State Security and questioned about her motives. She is let go but is aware they are monitoring her movements and communications. In NYC Lulu encounters a similar network of spies and agents as she is connected with a group of dissidents through her studies. The final third of the book only partly redeems its earlier lack of excitement.

A subplot in this novel is Lulu’s PhD adviser Bailey who tries to get her into bed, first with charm and then by threatening the final outcome of her dissertation. It’s a widely whispered affliction at institutes of higher education, sometimes with willing participants but more often by tacit coercion. Lulu is nevertheless published by a dissident owned printhouse in New York City. When she returns to China during Columbia’s summer break, carrying copies of the book, she is barred from re-entering her homeland as Ha Jin had before her.

[Lee Must · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve been thinking about this book for a while after finishing it. It reads very fast; the language is plain, straightforward, clearly written. Time also seems to pass very quickly in the text because of the simple language. We rocket through the years at the pace most convenient for exposition. But I wasn’t reading this book for its innovative prose. I understand and even came to enjoy it as it was.

The main character feels a little bit like a hollow vessel for the ideologies of the story; authority (national and academic), curiosity, passion, risk, all feel like they *happen* to her. I also thought at times that the book was exemplary of a female character written by a man, and that some of the thoughts she has about sex, or relationships, or menstruation, seemed jarringly out of place and outdated for even the era of the book. But she is dedicated to her intellectual exploration of resistance and the truth, even though her naïveté, and commitment to her family, ultimately pose a life-altering challenge.

But some of these effects made the plot of the story even more real and raw. Lulu’s relationship with her family, her hopes and goals as an international student in the US, her academic journey and the mentors she meets, all felt shockingly vivid. I found some aspects to be incredibly relatable. She’s constantly drawn to this one idea, she finds pleasure in her work and views academic work as rigorous work in a way that resonates with where I am in life, and maintains an impactful relationship with her first mentor at undergrad (a young, ingenious postdoc at the time).

The book spends time in the nitty gritty details of Lulu’s PhD applications and completions, at first seemingly more than is really necessary, but perhaps there is something to be said for the nuanced bureaucracy of academia and the closed-door politics of harassment she encounters at Columbia paralleling the authoritarian secret security arm of the state of China. Maybe these systems are not meant to be seen as parallel in actuality, because they certainly aren’t, but in a book occupied with its main character questioning the narrative, it isn’t surprising that she would find another challenge in something that she otherwise saw as a path toward freedom.

I’m familiar with the history and politics of the Chinese regime and found the details of the individual students’ topics and the activists’ perspectives compelling even in this fictional tale. Combine that with academia and of course I’m interested in this.

I’m not sure I’d call this book poignant, but I’d really call it important. It paints a clear picture of the dangers and risk posed to citizens of an authoritarian regime whose intellectual activity interrogates state actions even slightly. It explores modern China and also the United States in a harsh yet sympathetic (to the people) light. And I found it really interesting.

[Richard Hessney · Rating 3 out of 5]

I agree with Andrew Taylor's 3-star review. As a novel it's so-so and the ending is a dud. The possibility of the tank man photo being staged as Chinese propaganda is intriguing. On a personal level I could relate to the main character's Ph.D. studies at Columbia, since I got a Ph.D. there in the late '70s. No doubt Ha Jin is right about China being a vast "pig farm."

The real value of the book is its depiction of how the Chinese Communist government has whitewashed the Tienanmen Massacre and oppressed the population.

A few quotes I liked:
"To remember is the most efficient way to fight the authoritarian power that makes people forget. A historian's business is to remember." (Tiananmen activist character Loana)
"...we felt we were living in a tight net, as if there were an invisible wall around us all the time. I had heard that ultimately the government intended to turn the country into a wall-less prison, since most things can be handled electronically, and that we were heading toward a cashless society. If you are identified as an unacceptable citizen, the state can invalidate your ID and close your bank account. And then you will be impounded and even earning a living will be out of the question, since you can't buy groceries or travel anywhere. Whenever you went out, the police would be alerted and follow you. This electronic imprisonment will become the common condition for most Chinese in the future. In some netizens' words, 'Even if you grew wings, you couldn't fly anywhere. You'll be grounded in this immense pig farm.'" (Lulu, after a run-in with State Security)

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is my first read of Ha Jin. Truthfully I wasn’t a huge fan of the writing, as it seemed heavily plotted, the characters stiffly drawn, and character development rather clunky and at times inexplicable.. I’m presuming it’s not his best work since he got so many awards for his earlier writing.

I was however very appreciative of the historical detail he provided of both the Tiananmen massacre, as well as some of the theories surrounding tank man. I kind of wonder if this wasn’t written just as a way of introducing the Tianamen massacre to new generations of Chinese students who have never heard of it thanks to the PRCs ridiculous coverup of those events which nobody who witnessed it on CNN will ever forget.

The window into the trials and tribulations of PhD.students was kind of interesting as well. Who knew that you could study for a doctorate for free? I didn’t, but the academic advisors in the book said it’s so, so who am I to doubt? A free PhD, in the humanities no less! God is great, at least at Ivy League schools.

[Deborah · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

A young Chinese woman studying at Harvard learns for the first time of the existence of the Tiananmen Square massacre, as all information about the student demonstration for democracy is brutally suppressed, even criminalized, by the authoritarian Chinese government. She’s especially captivated by photos of “tank man,” the young man who stationed himself in front of a line of tanks, preventing their forward progress. The more she learns about the events of that time, the more fascinated she becomes and the more determined to keep digging for the truth. Her interest changes the direction her life takes, as she decides to continue her studies in the States beyond an undergraduate degree, spending summers in China with her single mother. Her growing knowledge changes her sense of her country, and as she tries to continue her research during visits home, she is menaced by the police, and monitored when she’s in the States.

[Posey · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars. 'Looking for Tank Man' is a novel with the spirits of a memoir and academic nonfiction. The academic research was impressive, and the various characters' discourse on China's socio-political landscape, Taiwan's sovereignty, and toggling one's life and effects between China and the US gave clear perspectives, drawn from both the real-life and theoretical.

On a personal note, 'Looking for Tank Man' made references to subjects and figures I recognized from my academic studies. From Chai Ling to Leftover Women, 'Looking for Tank Man' was intellectually stimulating while also viscerally touching, bringing me back to a specific time in my life and making me think about a life in China I could have lived.

[David Yamane · Rating 4 out of 5]

In June of 1989, I was visiting a friend at UC-Santa Cruz when I was confronted by a video of a solitary man blocking a column of tanks on Chang’an Avenue in Beijing. The tanks were headed to Tiananmen Square to put down a student uprising there. As a 20-year-old student myself, the image touched me more than anything else in my memory.

Ha Jin revisits the events at Tiananmen Square from the perspective of Pei Lulu, a Chinese undergrad at Harvard when she first learns about the massacre. Lulu makes the massacre the subject of her doctoral dissertation in history at Columbia and the story follows her trying to learn about an event that Chinese authority want to forget. Along the way we get some political, family, academic, and personal drama to animate the plot.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beautifully written, engrossing storytelling.
It was fascinating to watch the narrator attempting to navigate her way between two such vastly different worlds as China and the US. The author uses the vehicle of his main character's pursuit of higher education to explore the legacy of "Tank Man", the iconic figure at the heart of the Tiananmen Square, pro-democracy demonstrations. In her attempt to identify the solitary man, facing Chinese tanks, with nothing but his determination and shopping bag, Pei Lulu discovers the hidden context of the act and the image. She finds her own connections to the event and, finally, her own path forward.
A wonderful entry point for those of us outside China.

[Shane · Rating 3 out of 5]

A quick read because, unfortunately, there isn’t much substance to slow it down. The writing is flat and offers little in terms of description.

Chapters end in a matter-of-fact manner, almost as if they were diary entries: (speaking of the romantic relationship between two minor characters) “Maybe it hadn’t worked out between them. I refrained from asking her about this.”

As far as plot and tension, the opportunities felt wasted. Between the coercion of the Chinese government and the sexual harassment of a mentor, it felt like there were plenty of reasons for us to care about and root for the main character. At times, I felt like I care about her more than the author. By the end of the novel, though, I doubt I will remember her (or it).

[Darby · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a fun read! There were times when it dragged and that's why I knocked a star off but it was very informative. The writing style was easy to digest and made the history being thrown at you easy to understand and created a vivid picture. I enjoyed reading about Lulu's academic journey and her coming-of-age story while she discovers the truth about the Tiananmen Massacre as well as her own personal involvement! I wish I could have continued her journey with her and to me, that signals a great book! I've been inspired to consider continuing my educational journey and I will definitely be reading this again when I make a decision.

[Nora · Rating 1 out of 5]

I've heard from those who like that book that Ha Jin is writing in this very simple way to reflect the Chinese girl/ main character who is learning to write in English. That doesn't make it easier to read- why would I want to read a book that reads like a poor translation? I didn't care about anyone in the book, and by the end, I didn't care about Tank Man either. I think the way Lulu saw the world and narrated it was probably just very culturally different from how I see and narrate my world. Her take was devoid of any emotion and was extremely boring to me. She didn't seem to have any personality. She was obviously written by a man in many cliché ways, as well.

[Dave Bennett · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have vague memories of hearing about the Tiananmen Square incident when it happened, but in the years since, the solitary image of the “tank man” has become my only touchstone to this atrocity. This fictional view of a young Chinese ex-pat searching for meaning in this person (hero? plant? normal person?) was a brisk read that educated me beyond that single moment that was captured on film. It also shows the fear the Chinese government instills in its populace, as her research moves her further away from the party line and her life becomes monitored.

[Laura · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had such high hopes for this book as an avid reader of Ha Jin’s previous works, but this one fell a little flat. It was educational to learn about all the perspectives on Tiananmen Square-just needed more emotion and even elaboration. Still, these lines were highlights for me:

“The world is improved by impractical people” (p.101).

“We do something that can sustain our humanity and sanity” (p.123).

[Eve · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 - this was super interesting and it was cool to learn about something in history that I had little to no knowledge of. I enjoyed LuLu’s story and the coming of age aspects. It’s also super interesting to read the discussions on government surveillance especially with the state of the US right now. The writing was a little bland and the chapters always ended super abruptly. The ending was a little unsatisfying but overall I enjoyed it.

[Tristan Carr · Rating 2 out of 5]

“Writing should communicate more than speech, and also be sharper and more transparent.”

Decided to switch it up and read something a little different than what I usually devour. My biggest critique for this is the tone of the novel was just all over the place. It would go from “I am eating dinner with a friend talking about boys” to “my dad lost a pinky in a political uprising” in the matter of seconds. So it was like getting whiplash a lot. The concept? Amazing. The end product? Mixed bag!

[Katie]

A real "why was this a novel and not an essay" type of book. I was fascinated by the subject matter but the most engaging elements were matters of historical fact, and not necessarily what the author did to transform, engage with, or contextualize it.

It did, however, put in my mind the fact that there exists a Chinese translation of 1984, censored by the CCP, which is one of the most bleak and baffling concepts I've ever encountered.

[Andrew Taylor · Rating 3 out of 5]

At its best, it examines the events at Tiananmen Square in a resoundingly holistic way meant to interest the reader, just like Lulu’s dissertation. At its worst (most of the book) it is a flat coming of age story with poor resolution. The ending fell to a thud and the book was just not the most fun to read.

[Lauren M · Rating 2 out of 5]

Maybe I didn't fully understand the synopsis, but this book really didn't focus on the Tank Man as much as I would have been led to believe.

If I would have known that this was going to be another college girl figuring her schooling shit out, I would have passed.

The bits about the differences in freedoms between America and China were interesting, but that was about it.

[Linda Powell · Rating 4 out of 5]

I so enjoyed this book. I was fascinated by the long reach of the Chinese government into dissidents living around the world. I really didn’t know that some people did not believe what happened at Tiananmen Square. A girlfriend of mine‘s mother was there at the time and was witnessed to some of it. I was also intrigued by the whole set up of advanced academia. I recommend this book