“I can’t keep going much longer.”
Wang Yanlin, 28, had never imagined that her life would fall apart so suddenly and completely.
Her boyfriend of many years, Yang Tingli, whom she had planned to marry, calmly walked away under his mother’s influence, leaving her with the cruel farewell, “It’s for your own good.” Almost at the same time, the sordid private life her father, Wang Jianguo, had kept hidden for years came to light. He had not only started another family behind their backs, but had also squandered their already meager savings on countless fleeting affairs. The final straw was the company, teetering amid the economic downturn: pay cuts, fabricated accusations, a coldly delivered “performance improvement plan,” and even her superior’s veiled but unmistakable harassment...
Behind her lay the ruins of a world turned upside down. Ahead stood her mother, Liu Shuzhen, eyes swollen with tears. Proud but lacking in ability, this retired woman had been left utterly adrift after the double blow of her husband’s betrayal and a friend’s treachery. Her entire social circle had collapsed.
This is no power fantasy about a triumphant comeback, but a hard crawl through the cramped confines of reality.
Wang Yanlin can only grit her teeth, gather what remains of her wits, and help her mother to her feet. With her sharp-tongued lawyer friend Shen Xiyue offering coldly perceptive advice, and the socially adept self-media creator Lin Xiaoyan scheming for traffic, she begins a bitter fight to defend their dignity and survive: gathering evidence, facing off in court, and struggling to stay afloat on the brink of unemployment...
There are no perfect victims in this story, and no savior who appears out of nowhere. There is only the faint, shadowy glimmer of human nature, the bone-deep chill of economic hardship, and the tangled complexities of family and friendship. After seeing life for what it is, they try amid the wreckage to build themselves a place to stand again, even if it is small, as long as it is solid enough.
