John Lee is a lonely and increasingly misanthropic Chinese migrant whohas lived in Auckland for thirty years, running a second-hand junk shop whilemaintaining a relationship of disdain with his disabled wife. When hebecomes infatuated with a young international student who lodges in theirhouse, and puts his life savings behind a scheme to export powdered milk toChina, the dubious balance with which he has held his life together comes apart,and feelings of alienation and humiliation begin to spiral out of control.

Dry Milkis a work of fiction that gives a perspective on Antipodean culture unlike anyother, told from the point of view of an immigrant alienated from his new home,both its New Zealand and Chinese communities. Huo's novella is a stark portraitof social isolation, and of the experience of the emigrants that left China inthe period after the Cultural Revolution. Capturing the voice of China's post-1980sliterary generation, the book is written with an obsessive intensity thatechoes Patricia Highsmith, Elias Canetti and the short novels of ElenaFerrante.