In 1959, when Tian Zhiguo, with his head full of dreams of sorghum fields, arrived at Zhongzhou Machinery Factory on the western outskirts of Zhongzhou, Guan Xiuqin was still raising pigs and chickens in the countryside of Ruyang. Ten years later, she followed Tian Zhiguo into the factory residential compound. Their eldest daughter, Tian Xiaolan, was born in 1972. Five years later, they had their second daughter, Tian Xiaomei. In the early 1980s, their son, Tian Xiaojun, arrived just in time to catch the last train of the new policies, making Tian Zhiguo, now past forty, grin from ear to ear.
More than a decade passed in the blink of an eye, and at last the time came for Tian Zhiguo to leave the factory...
A very real and realistic novel, changing in the midst of reform, reforming in the midst of change, and the progress of a family of five.