Paper bracelet

Author: A Wen
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-12-01
Features: This is the story of a vast family that began to decline in the late 20th century. The Lu family left behind a string of pearls, each made of paper and containing a story. The original pearls were passed down from ancestors who were officials during the Qing Dynasty, and the secrets hidden within them were a treasure earned at the expense of the people. However, the descendants, out of reverence and superstition for their ancestors, never revealed the secrets within the pearls. They merely continued the tradition—whenever a man who represented a generation was about to leave this world, they wrote down the most private things of his life on a small piece of paper, then had a skilled artisan roll the paper into a pearl and coat it with glue. The Lu family's genealogy was filled with names, but the true lives of each generation were hidden within those pearls. Eventually, the Lu family lost all its male descendants, leaving behind only a girl. The bracelet on her wrist contained only the last true pearl. She believed in her ancestors' prophecy: the Lu family could only last for five generations, and out of those five generations, only 15 people would leave behind paper pearls. She was not qualified to trade her own life's secrets for the last pearl. She had to open all the paper "pearls" to uncover a century-old secret. A heavy history of a century and a fresh, innocent girl—over the years, the different beliefs of each generation of the Lu family and their helplessness toward life, the unchangeable time and journey, and the choices they could make in terms of attitude and ideals. The novel objectively portrays the ethics of the past century through the psychology and mindset of modern people, while interpreting the accumulated history through the consciousness and thinking of contemporary youth. With limited space, the novel touches on the backgrounds of various historical and modern periods, offering a vast amount of information and profound themes.