Empire of Glass

by Kaitlin Solimine Narrated by Joshua Fu, Si Chen

Overview

In the mid-1990s, an American teenager, named Lao K in Chinese, stands on Coal Hill, a park in Beijing, a loop of rope in her hand. Will she assist her Chinese homestay mother, Li-Ming, who is dying of cancer, in ending her life, or will she choose another path? Twenty years later, Lao K receives a book written by Li-Ming called “Empire of Glass,” a narrative that chronicles the lives of Li-Ming and her husband, Wang, in pre and post-revolutionary China over the last half of the twentieth century. Lao K begins translating the story, which becomes the novel we are reading. But, as translator, how can Lao K separate fact from fiction, and what will her role be in the book's final chapter?

A grand, experimental epic-Lao K's story is told in footnotes that run throughout the book-that chronicles the seismic changes in China over the last half century through the lens of one family's experiences, Empire of Glass is an investigation into the workings of human memory and the veracity of oral history that pushes the boundaries of language and form in stunning and unforgettable ways.

Editorial Reviews

Publishers Weekly

08/07/2017
Solimine’s debut novel, inspired by her mid-1990s teenage experience of living with a family in China, is a complex, lyrical, and unsparing revelation about the old and new China and the hardships faced by an ordinary Chinese couple who survived Mao’s cultural revolution. The story unfolds as a memoir left by wife and mother Li-Ming, given 20 years after her death to her American exchange student “daughter”—dubbed Lao K by Li-Ming’s family—who became part of the family and now has translated the account, which Li-Ming entitled Empire of Glass. Li-Ming describes the difficulties of growing up in the shadow of her politically shamed mother and the hardships her husband endured, first as an impoverished child selling rejected glass lenses ground by his tirelessly working father, then as a soldier in the Red Army. Lao K’s annotations clarify, expand, or comment on the narrative, occasionally including the poetry of Han-Shan, a Tang Dynasty Chinese poet whose work was forbidden during the cultural revolution. It’s not clear how much of what Li-Ming has written is true; she painted an evocative history while secreting away the knowledge that she was dying of cancer and was aware her words would be her legacy. It may fall to Lao K to help her in a way her own daughter and husband cannot. The author leaves us to consider the actions one can and cannot do out of pure love. (July)

Product Details

BN ID:	2940192783733
Publisher:	Everand Productions
Publication date:	05/14/2024
Edition description:	Unabridged

Videos