Renshu asks what happened next and Meilin explains that the old fisherman stayed in this paradise. When he leaves his boat and walks through the grove, he discovers a utopia of rice and tea fields with people of all ages laughing and dogs playing. The classic story of Peach Blossom Spring, which dates from the 5th century, involves an old fisherman who falls asleep and later finds himself before a grove of peach trees. The title of the book comes from one of the stories in the scroll Meilin tells Renshu after they leave Chongqing for the next stage of their escape from the war. Peach Blossom Spring, Melissa Fu (Wildfire, Little, Brown, March 2021) We have to keep going to see what the next one is.” We can only unroll it one scene at a time. “This,” she gestures at the landscape around them, scarred with burned fields and abandoned, bombed-out structures, the river crowded with boats of all sizes heading upstream, and people walking with forlorn burdens, “this is just one scene.

When they encounter destruction on their escape, Meilin also explains to her son that they are in effect living in a real life scroll of stories. Each portion of the scroll tells a different story and Meilin only tells him one story at a time. Although she can always sell it if they run out of money or food, it also serves as entertainment for young Renshu when they’re on the run. He had been killed in action and it’s in his memory that she includes this scroll in the few belongings she carries. As Meilin prepares to leave, she packs an antique scroll her late husband had given her. This is the backdrop of Melissa Fu’s debut novel, Peach Blossom Spring. Army jeeps weave through the masses, headed against the flow, towards the burning city. And there are some who escaped with only their nightclothes and whatever they could grab. Many people are on foot, balancing shoulder poles with hastily packed and overflowing baskets. Some in carts, some in wagons filled with families, furniture, pots, sacks of grain. The roads are filling as others flee the blaze.

But first Meilin and her four-year-old son Renshu must escape in one piece. As the Japanese advance through China in 1938, a young widowed mother aims to flee her Changsha home in 1938 for the relative safety of the newly-established capital of Chongqing.

Peach blossom spring by melissa fu