Four Treasures Of The Sky

 The idea for the novel, Four Treasures Of The Sky, by Jenny Tinghui Zhang, came from a plaque marking the location of a violent event in Idaho against law abiding Chinese people. The story starts in China with a girl named Daiyu. She lives with her parents and her grandmother making tapestry. When she is nine her parents disappear. For a time she lives with her grandmother. After several months her grandmother cuts her hair, dresses her like a boy, and pays a local farmer to haul her to the city to make her way on her own. Grandmother says she will come to find her one day. Daiyu begs for food and eats out of the trash. One day she asks a teacher of calligraphy for a job. She gets a job sweeping. For this she is given a place to sleep and some food. She also learns calligraphy and is quite good at it. One day she is kidnapped and taken to a basement room. There she is taught English. Eventually she is dressed in black clothes, black is smeared on her face and hands, she is put into a barrel and coal is added. A cloth is stuck in her mouth and tied to her head. She is loaded aboard a ship that is sailing to San Francisco. She has been sold to a brothel. From there she escapes and heads to Idaho and again pretends to be a boy. This was an interesting story but so very sad. Daiyu does not have many moments of joy in her short life.