REVIEW: I Deliver Parcels in Beijing (nonfiction book) by Hu Anyan, translated by Jack Hargreaves

I Deliver Parcels in Beijing is basically a work-related memoir. I bought my copy new.

Review:

This starts off with an in-depth look at a couple of the author's work experiences, first working the night shift at a vast logistics warehouse, and then working as a courier delivering parcels in Beijing. After that, the author went backwards in time in order to cover basically every one of his work experiences from his school days onward, including working at restaurants, working at a bike shop, and owning his own clothing store, before finally catching up with the experiences that started the volume off.

I didn't know anything about this book before going into it. This is one of those cases where I was hooked by the title and cover. The first part of the book was more what I expected I might get, based on the title. I definitely did not expect the author to cover his entire life's work experiences, so I floundered a bit there, not sure where the author was ultimately planning to go with the book.

The author ended up talking about his personal philosophies about work (which, unfortunately, didn't interest me much), as well as his gradual development of fairly severe social anxiety. By the end, I felt like I had a decent grasp of what sort of person the author was, but very little idea of what his day-to-day life was like beyond work.

The book starts with a translator's note that I later found myself wishing had been more than just a couple pages. For example, the translator talked about the concept of "neighborhoods" in cities in Beijing, but I also found myself wishing that this section had contextualized Hu Anyan's work experiences more. I could and did compare the author's accounts to my own work experiences (more differences than similarities), but I had no idea how his work experiences might compare to those of others throughout China. Heck, I'd have loved to know a little more about how his experiences compared in those working similar jobs in other areas of the world.

All in all, this was an interesting enough book that occasionally got to the point of outstaying its welcome.