Weaving back and forth between China in the 1990s and America in 2010s, three people's lives are changed by a murder one of them may have committed in this magnificent novel from Yiyun Li, newly reissued. When Moran, Ruyu, and Boyang were young, they were involved in a mysterious incident in which a friend of theirs was poisoned. Grown up, the three friends are separated by distance and personal estrangement. Moran and Ruyu live in the United States, Boyang in China; all of them are haunted by what happened in their youth and by doubt about themselves. In Wisconsin, Moran visits her ex-husband, whose kindness once overcame her flight into solitude. In California, Ruyu helps a local woman care for her family and home, avoiding entanglements, as she has done all her life. In Beijing, Boyang struggles to deal with an inability to love--and with the outcome of what happened among the friends twenty years before. Brilliantly written and a breathtaking page-turner, Kinder Than Solitude resonates with provocative observations about human nature and life.

In mesmerizing prose, and with profound insight, Yiyun Li weaves a remarkable story that explores the impact of personality and the past on the shape of a person's present and future.