Book Trailer and Excerpts
(Playing in the background of the trailer and cited in the following excerpt is the Chinese Guzheng music: "Gao Shan Liu Shui" - high mountain, flowing water - performed by Qin Jun  )



( Watch in high resolution on YouTube)

"Snow Line" (Excerpt)

image...Shiao Su opened his sleepy eyes and was confused for a few seconds.

 "How…how come you are here?" 

"I want you to come home with me." 

He did not know what to say so he said he needed to go to the bathroom. When he went, Qian-qian sat down and waited. To pass the time she read the open page, page 3484, of the big book in front of her:

Entry: “Gao Shan Liu Shui”
Source: Liezi, “Tang Wen”
Period:  Han Dynasty

Boya excelled at playing Zheng, Ziqi personified listening. Boya's music craving for mountains, Ziqi exclaimed, “towering high cliffs.” Boya's music admiring rivers, Ziqi proclaimed, “gracious running waters.” Ziqi died, Boya smashed the Zheng and never played again.

The text was in archaic Chinese. Qian-qian did not recognize several words and she could not understand the context.  This was not like a textbook of any of Shiao Su's subjects. In fact she had never seen Shiao Su bring this book home before.

Shiao Su came back and saw Qian-qian's questioning expression. He closed the big book and said to her, "Let's go home."

*  *  *

It was another dusk and the setting sun was little by little slanting into rosy clouds.  There was a filament of coldness in the autumn air.  Shiao Su's bike crunched the fallen leaves across half of the city.  At the printing shop he stood his bike against the wall, not taking the time to lock it, and hurriedly walked on to the hallway that led to Yue Zhu's room.

The sound of a familiar piece of Zheng music slowed down his steps.  His heart pictured Yue Zhu's lean fingers stroking the long strings.  Wood hammering metal, breakers dashing on rocks, waters falling off the cliff, echoes fading in the valley… For how many thousands of years had this soul-searching “Gao Shan Liu Shui” been played and listened to?  Shiao Su leaned his forehead against the closed door and shut his eyes.  The vibration of the Zheng strings passed through the door to his body.  He lost the courage to knock on the door.

Peng! A sudden sound, the sound of a taut metal string snapping, sprung Shiao Shu's forehead off the door.  He heard her wince inside.  He stepped back in panic.  This could not be happening! This should only be in folklore!  That an instrument's string would break if someone who truly understood the music were eavesdropping…

 The door opened. Yue Zhu smiled at him...




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"Pivot Point" (Excerpt)
The first time Lanbo asked me to wait for him, it was Su Ting’s poem that flashed through my mind: “Wait for love to walk into the sun.”  I want to travel with you to every mountain every water, I told him, and he said, when the time comes, any place is a good place.

Meanwhile, ashamed of a daughter yet to be betrothed at age 26, my mother begged all her acquaintances to match-make for me. I saw in her eyes the fear that I would soon be joining the large crowd of “aging youth,” a peculiar 1980s label for leftover urban women unable to find mates. During the Cultural Revolution, an entire generation had been sent to the countryside, and spent the best part of their youth in alien fields, determined not to marry until allowed back to the city. When they did finally return, the men went for younger girls, while their female peers were left to age alone. It was like the aftermath of war, except that the men were wed instead of dead.