Quality of the gold

How Much of These Hills Is Gold

After their father dies in the night and their mother is long gone, 12-year-old Lucy and 11-year-old Sam, orphaned immigrants in California, flee with their father's body across a land that denies their existence, searching for a place to bury him. Along the way, the two children encounter giant buffalo bones, tiger paw prints, and a desolate landscape, also unveiling family secrets and sibling divisions.

This is a full-length novel set against the backdrop of the Chinese gold rush in America, where two children escape across a ruthless land—not only to survive but also to find a home.

Zhang Chenji, a Chinese-American writer born in the 1990s, debuts with this novel, shortlisted for the 2020 Booker Prize.

It challenges the long-standing erasure of Chinese people in the American origin myth, creating rare Chinese-American figures in the American Western narrative.

"A heartbreaking book, made up of myths (including a tiger roaming the Western hills), joy and sorrow created by Zhang Chenji. It is powerful, surprising, and musical. The story itself, like protagonists Lucy and Sam, wanders along the trails, winding, turning, and sometimes adventurous. By the end of the journey, you will be enriched and enlightened by the lives you have witnessed."
— The New York Times

"This book offers a narrative that is diametrically opposed to the traditional stories of American origins, and it also examines the more intimate aspects of belonging and memory, questioning again and again: 'What makes a house a home?'"
— The New Yorker

"Certainly the boldest debut of the year."
— The Guardian

"Zhang Chenji's stunning debut novel moves back and forth through time, asking bluntly: What does it take to carve out a place in the American Dream?... Just as she reworks the clichés of the Western novel, she also works with language, interweaving Chinese phrases with a cowboy accent, and blending the myth of the tiger with the fable of the roaming buffalo. Her writing is superb and captivating."
— USA Today

"The prose in this book is visceral, thought-provoking, and beautiful; the plot is heartbreaking, and the author's talent is dazzling. Zhang Chenji is a brilliant writer."
— Daisy Johnson (Author of Deep Water)

"An intoxicatingly written anti-Western, Zhang Chenji's debut is pure gold."
— Emma Donoghue (Author of Room)

2024-04-01

上海译文出版社

Archipelago Books

308

9787532794331