On the nineteenth day of the third month of the seventeenth year of Chongzhen’s reign, Beijing fell and the emperor died for his country. That day, countless lives were changed forever.
Yao Xijun remembered that morning. When the Imperial Guards took her father, Yao Lianyu, away, he said only one thing: “If the ruler wants his subject dead, the subject has no choice but to die.” At the time, she didn’t know what being sentenced to “the entertainment bureau” meant. Not until she understood that from then on, she was no longer the daughter of a military commander, but an object for the powerful to enjoy as they pleased.
This book takes real history from the late Ming and early Qing as its framework, with fictional characters’ lives as its flesh and blood. It is seven parts history and three parts invention. Through the eyes of one woman, it shows the many faces of humanity as the land falls apart: some meet death with courage, some cling to life at any cost, some betray their friends for power, and some remain steadfast to the end.
The story spans twenty years, from Beijing to Nanjing, Hangzhou to Guangzhou, Xiamen to Taiwan. Time and again, this woman thinks she has found love, only to be abandoned, sold, and trampled underfoot. She has hated and resented, but in the end, all that remains is the will to live.
This is not a tale of revenge and triumph. It is a lament for a fallen nation, one woman’s history of blood and tears, and an epitaph for an era.
