The Boy Moves Forward

A realist novel about the struggle to survive among society’s poorest in the late 1990s.

Twelve-year-old A Shu is forced to leave home to save his ailing mother and protect his little sister, taking shelter with relatives in the county town. Between the scorching heat of the brick kiln and the faint glimmer of a dictionary, he grows as tenaciously as a weed.

With delicate detail, the story depicts the sparks of humanity and the choices people make under the crushing weight of poverty. It asks whether a child steeped in hardship can use his newly learned literacy to carve out a different future for himself.