The Red Wind Howls was a bit of a mixed bag for me. On the plus side, I think it's wonderful for such a work to be released to gain a wider readership, as it sounds as if the author has faced a lot of trouble over the writing of it. At times, this reminded me of The Good Soldier Švejk in the way it uses moments of silliness and humour on the part of the main character to disclose deeper, darker issues. I was invested in the book for the first half, but by the second half it began to feel a little repetitive and I started to grow weary of the fragmentary style of the narrative, so I did find myself skim-reading a bit as we moved into the final third. Overall, I am giving the book three stars. I think it's an important work that tells of a somewhat hidden part of recent history, but its narrative style is not going to be for everyone.

I’ve read a sizable number of books set during the upheavals of Maoist of China - historical works, memoirs, and historical fiction titles. But until now, I had never read any works that took place anywhere close to the Tibetan regions of the country, which in immediate retrospect should be of very little surprise considering it’s not exactly a tale that certain people and powers want easily told and heard, to understate the situation just a bit. So, the simple fact that a work like “The Red Wind Howls” is actually now readily available as an officially translated and published work frankly feels nothing short of amazing.

I wasn’t even finished with this work before I already decided that this was definitely a new must-have for the academic library that I work. Due to it being based on both archival materials and interviews that author Tsering Dondrup courageously gathered from those who endured the hardships described in these pages, “The Red Wind Howls” is far more than a new world for avid historical fiction readers like myself to dive into. By providing my first glance (and almost a firsthand glance given the source material) into this part of Tibet at this time, I found the book to be a genuine learning experience.