Truly an exquisite story! Beautifully rendered and timeless. This one will stay with you for a long time. She also wrote "Streetof a Thousand Blossoms," "One Hundred Flowers,""Women of the Silk," and "The Language of Threads."
"The daughter of a Chinese mother and a Japanese father, Tsukiyama uses
the Japanese invasion of China during the late 1930s as a somber
backdrop for her unusual story about a 20-year-old Chinese painter named
Stephen who is sent to his family's summer home in a Japanese coastal
village to recover from a bout with tuberculosis. Here he is cared for
by Matsu, a reticent housekeeper and a master gardener. Over the course
of a remarkable year, Stephen learns Matsu's secret and gains not only
physical strength, but also profound spiritual insight."
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