At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Republic of China, salt winds surged, rivers changed their courses, and cities and people were quietly changing their shape. The Lou family of the Yangzhou family, with the caution and arrogance of a generation of salt merchants, walked carefully between the court's tax plate and the worms in the market. The eldest daughter, Lou Yiyun, grew up listening to the rough chants from the Salt Hall, but her eyes were looking further ahead - Shanghai where trams were passing, the hot news on the pages, and the future where people were singing about new learning and new policies. During a night flight, she witnessed a salt-stealing ship being forced to stop by the gunfire of an anti-smuggling team. The ripples under the oil lamp illuminated many forbearing eyes. In the following years, she had to face even greater undercurrents: salt course reform, the Revolution of 1911, warlord separatism, strikes and shootings, and the turbulent 1930s. Gu Peiran, a journalist with a sharp writing skills; Zhao Hanchao, a military policeman with bright clothes but desolate heart; Jiang Yifeng, a "slinger" with a scholar background; Shen Yuesheng, a man on the river with a pole in his hand - all of them are entangled with her like the tide, from acquaintance to separation, from hesitation to decision, they are all ups and downs on the waves of the times. Before hundreds of rivers merge into the sea, they first pass through canyons and tear apart stone bones. Lou Yiyun used her intuition and stubbornness to protect the shop and workers, as well as people's dignity and anger. In the end, she learned to put the abacus of the old world and the machinery of the new world on the same table, and understood that "home" and "country" were never separated by two words, but two sides of the same river. This book uses realistic writing to unfold the growth and separation of a ten-year dream, witnessing the intertwining of the sound of the city and the sound of gunfire, and witnessing the sprouts of human hearts sprouting from the ruins.
