The blurb for my next book, When the Forest Runs Deep, is at the end.
Now publishing, currently serializing. Please add it to your favorites, thank you!
----------------- Separation -----------------
Keywords: Showbiz, mutual crush.
The story began when Lin Jiao started working with a celebrity of legendary status, notorious for "staying out all night," "having their romance exposed," and "hitting someone at the airport."
1. Lin Jiao admits she used to have a crush on Jiang Li.
Even in his first year of middle school, Jiang Li was already the best among his peers.
Every wealthy wife in Beijing's social circle had picked him out as her future son-in-law.
He was brilliant, mature, and steady.
But to Lin Jiao, Jiang Li was an immature idiot who climbed up to the archive room window to steal exam questions, only to crack his head because the glass was so clean.
Since Jiang Li only played with her at school, everyone thought they were made for each other.
Unfortunately, fate had other plans. At eighteen, Jiang Li went to study in Chicago, and on the day she saw him off, they couldn't even manage to get a proper goodbye out.
For a while, he thought he'd lost the girl for good.
Luckily, they reunited at twenty-four.
2.
Lin Jiao reclaimed the initiative, leaned against the sofa, and crossed her legs restlessly.
"You've done a pretty good job training this employee!"
She watched her assistant leave, smiling without the slightest attempt to hide it.
"My assistant quit. Can I borrow this one for a few days?"
Jiang Li looked at Lin Jiao with a half-smile.
"So, you came all the way over first thing in the morning just for this?"
"And when you need someone, you come asking me with that attitude?"
Jiang Li tugged at his tie as he looked at Lin Jiao, lounging like a cat.
After six years apart, Jiang Li had lost the baby fat in his chin, replaced by a sharply defined jawline.
"Well, you're distinguished and talented, learned and magnanimous, aren't you?"
Lin Jiao muttered a whole string of stock compliments in a playful tone.
She casually flipped through the entertainment magazine that had arrived with her coffee. The male star on the cover wore a hairpiece, and his long eyeliner was surrounded by all sorts of fashion details she couldn't understand.
A familiar name made her immediately start putting him down.
"Unlike that... what's his name, Mo Li? He's not respectable at all."
"Heh... Not respectable?" Jiang Li chuckled.
"You don't follow entertainment news, do you?"
"Well, I don't really pay attention..."
Lin Jiao blinked her innocent, wide eyes. She thought she caught a hint of resemblance in his features, and a bad feeling stirred inside her.
"I joined the entertainment industry. Mo Li is my stage name."
The heiress screenwriter x her childhood friend, a hugely popular star
Blurb written on November 26, 2021. Saved.
Updates daily.
When the Forest Runs Deep
The calculating, obsessive actor-turned-star Lu Li x the self-destructive genius actress Lin Shen
At eighteen, Lin Shen and Lu Li were worlds apart.
At eighteen, Lin Shen had already won her first major award. A rising darling, she was hailed as Asia's angel and the spirit of the East.
At eighteen, Lu Li had dropped out of high school to work. One day, he happened to glance at a giant screen on a street corner. The girl on it had bright eyes and smoothly introduced a product's benefits. One smile was all it took for Lu Li to fall in love at first sight.
At twenty-eight, Lu Li and Lin Shen were worlds apart.
At twenty-eight, Lu Li had claimed the top three spots at the box office with three separate films. On his birthday, he was nominated for Best Actor.
Meanwhile, twenty-eight-year-old Lin Shen faced accusations of plastic surgery, declining acting skills, and endless scandals. Every platform had dropped her, and even domestic web dramas no longer wanted her as a leading actress.
These two, whose lives were so dramatically different, were never supposed to cross paths.
Yet on the night of a grand awards ceremony, Best Actor Lu Li turned to Lin Shen and proposed, every word clear and deliberate.
Lin Shen froze, then gave a casual, amused smile.
"All right."
"Honestly, it makes no difference to me who I marry."
If a crush is one person's celebration, then its highest form must be:
Watching you, chasing you, protecting you, saving you.
Blurb written on January 2, 2022.
Theme: Have dreams and work hard to live well.
