Happiness, Keep Going

After 2000, people’s lives continued to improve. With government support, a small village in northern China prepared to demolish the houses in its low-lying areas and build a more modern new village on higher ground, where it would be better suited for people to live.

At the same time, Wang Meng, Wang Zhen, and Xu Lu faced the most important choices of their lives.

Wang Zhen had always been a well-behaved girl. To help her family raise money to build a house, she followed her parents’ arrangements and went on a blind date, determined to marry a rich man. But things didn’t go as planned: the wealthy heir she met took one look at her cousin, Wang Meng, and fell for her instead.

Wang Meng, who was enamored with novels and idol dramas, went from resisting marriage to giving in because she didn’t want to make things difficult for her parents. She chose someone she found reasonably appealing and married him.

Xu Lu, a granddaughter on the Wang family’s maternal side, excelled in school and was widely regarded as a sure bet for university, a star in everyone else’s eyes. But raised by her grandparents from a young age, she was sensitive and insecure, yearning for family affection and love.

The coming-of-age stories of three girls.