Four Treasures of the Sky
Ratings12
Average rating4.3
A propulsive and dazzling debut novel set against the backdrop of the Chinese Exclusion Act, about a Chinese girl fighting to claim her place in the 1880s American West Daiyu never wanted to be like the tragic heroine for whom she was named, revered for her beauty and cursed with heartbreak. But when she is kidnapped and forced across an ocean from China to America, Daiyu must relinquish the home and future she imagined for herself. Over the years that follow, she is forced to keep reinventing herself to survive. From a calligraphy school, to a San Francisco brothel, to a shop tucked into the Idaho mountains, we follow Daiyu on a desperate quest to outrun the tragedy that chases her. As anti-Chinese sentiment sweeps across the country in a wave of unimaginable violence, Daiyu must draw on each of the selves she has been—including the ones she most wants to leave behind—in order to finally claim her own name and story. At once a literary tour de force and a groundbreaking work of historical fiction, Four Treasures of the Sky announces Jenny Tinghui Zhang as an indelible new voice. Steeped in untold history and Chinese folklore, this novel is a spellbinding feat.
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“In calligraphy, as in life, we do not retouch strokes. We must accept that what is done is done.”
A sad look at a period of US history I was unaware of, and one based (loosely) around a similar unjust real life event that took place in Idaho. I know that historical fiction sometimes plays fast and loose with facts and history, and while the characters here are made up to fit the roles of the actual real life event, the story told is plausible and compelling.
Daiyu grew up in China, but was kidnapped and shipped overseas to America by human traffickers looking for brothel workers. Forced to give up her name, her heritage, and her family, Daiyu nevertheless tries to fight a system under which she's already doomed to fail. Even as she slowly pieces together a life for herself, she is haunted by the (literal) ghost of her own past who desperately wants to return to the family and home she knew in China.
The true bits of the story revolve around the Page Act of 1875, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, and (plot spoilers here) an unsolved murder of five Chinese immigrants in Idaho, which all made for interesting (and dark) reading afterward. The author includes an afterword summarizing why she was inspired to write this book, and the audiobook at least included an interview with the author that was similarly interesting.
Lots of tough topics are tackled here, and if you're looking for a happy story, this isn't the book for you. TW for rape/sexual assault, human trafficking, racism, torture at the very least, but the story is told so beautifully that it offset the horrible things going on a bit.
This review originally appeared on Literary Quicksand: https://literaryquicksand.com/2022/07/what-we-read-in-june-2022/
Wow this book. Four Treasures of the Sky is absolutely beautiful, poetic at times, and also absolutely, devastatingly heartbreaking. This book broke me. I couldn't believe some of the beauty of the passages and themes in here - it was incredible. But it was SO. HARD. TO. READ. Oh my gosh, it was achingly sad. Just one of the most beautiful, saddest books I've ever read. This book will haunt me for a while. I had to rate it 5 stars...there's just no way this level of writing could be anything else.
