Books & Beyond

After moving to America with her husband five years ago, Mrs. Spring Fragrance, the wife of a Chinese merchant, mastered English and the way of thinking held by Americans. While comforting her neighbor Laura, Mrs. Spring Fragrance quoted an American poem: “’Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all?” which, however, got her husband concerned about her take on their arranged marriage.

Let's hear how Manling, the narrator of this audiobook, introduces Mrs. Spring Fragrance!

Follow the journey of Mrs. Spring Fragrance and witness the struggles and fights of those living on a rapidly changing exotic land, while holding on to their cultural traditions, or more importantly, to their identities.

Little Choy was envious of her elder sister's present, and started a hunger strike to vent her anger. To talk some sense into the little girl, Choy's mother told a tale about how two sulky crocodiles went on a strike by refusing food and sports. Instead of getting what they originally wanted, the crocodiles had to swallow the bitter fruit of their own making at the end.

After Pat, the little white boy, turned eight, he was taken away from his foster family, and sent to an American couple, so that he could be raised as a proper white boy. Ever since then, Pan's protective elder brother was gone forever.

With the request of Anna Harrison, the white lady, Pat, the white boy joined the school with his sister Pan, who was a Chinese. They were quite close and would defend each other.

On the street of a Chinatown in America, a white lady came across a little white boy, who was raised by a Chinese family, and spoke only Chinese.

Out of guilt, the young teacher Miss Mason wanted to stop the order from being carried out. So she went to have a conversation with Ku Yum's father about the upbringing of the little girl, but only to find out that Ku Yum was actually a BOY!

In a Los Angeles Chinatown school, a young American teacher felt the obligation to interfere in the life of a smart yet undisciplined Chinese girl Ku Yum. This let to an unexpected situation, in which Ku Yum was ordered to be taken away from her sole guardian, her father, and put under the custody of a rescue home in another city.

Lee Chu and Lee Yen had run to the beach on their way to school. But at the end of the day, they were not punished for they had brought home some finely shaped pebbles. Instead of keeping these exquisite stones, Lee Chu and Lee Yen decided to share the stones with their infant brother, the Little Fat One.