The work uses a string of Buddhist beads as an object clue and the "Three Generations of Buddhas" as a philosophical framework to tell the story of how a Chinese family faces the tension between tradition and modernity in a century of changes. The core concept it ultimately conveys is: the true inheritance is not to stick to the form, but to reinterpret the spiritual core in each era by the "present Buddha" in the present way, so that the past can live in the present and the future can grow from today. After three generations of confusion and reconciliation, they finally understood that each of us is the Buddha of our own time.
Very good and worth recommending!