From catching and hiding fish in the Dasha River as a boy, and learning about saline-alkali soil from his grandfather, to failing the college entrance exam at eighteen and heading to Qingdao with a sack slung over his shoulder; from chewing cold buns in a workers' shed and arguing with his foreman over a few yuan in wages, to saving up to build his family a red-brick house and helping Aunt Xiulan escape an abusive marriage; then, in middle age, returning to his hometown with the skills he learned in Qingdao to grow vegetables in winter greenhouses and start a willow-weaving cooperative, before finally watching drones fly over the cornfields: Yuan Yue's life is like a wild pear tree in northern Shandong, rooted deep in the earth yet slowly reaching higher with the times.
A sachet of locust blossoms holds a lifetime of affection between him and Huanzi; a horsehair-wrapped bundle carries his grandfather's wishes; and watermelon and fermented black bean sauce evoke the everyday warmth of northern Shandong. The end of grain coupons, greenhouse farming, rural revitalization: every turning point of the era bears the mark of his transformation alongside his hometown.
But the winds of change also bring hardship: young people leave for the cities, village schools merge, willow weaving faces the loss of its successors, and the old wild pear trees grow fewer by the year... Yuan Yue tends the cooperative, looks after left-behind children, and keeps watch over a village that grows emptier all the time. He learns to use AI to identify pests and diseases and control the greenhouses by phone, while protecting old crafts and old flavors. Caught between tradition and modernity, he gives everything he has to preserve the roots of Lishugou.
This is the story of Lishugou, and of every ordinary person who lives earnestly through the changing times.
