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Four Treasures of the Sky

The compelling debut about identity and belonging in the 1880s American West

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Four Treasures of the Sky

By: Jenny Tinghui Zhang
Narrated by: Katharine Chin
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About this listen

Daiyu is the orphaned daughter of a once influential, now missing, family. Alone and on the streets, she must rely on her wits to discover what happened to her family.

But when Daiyu is kidnapped and smuggled from China to America, she relinquishes the future she imagined.

Over the years that follow, she is forced to reinvent herself to survive. From a calligraphy school to a San Francisco brothel, to a shop tucked into the Idaho mountains of the Wild West, we follow Daiyu on a desperate quest to outrun the tragedy that chases her. As anti-Chinese sentiment sweeps across the country in a wave of unimaginable violence, Daiyu must draw on each of the selves she has been - including the ones she most wants to leave behind - in order to finally claim her own name and story.

 Family Life Fiction Genre Fiction Historical Fiction Women's Fiction World Literature China Heartfelt

Critic reviews

An engulfing, bighearted and heartbreaking novel. Illuminates shocking injustices, making us stop and consider how many survive to this day (Ann Patchett, author of Women's Prize longlisted The Dutch House)
An impressive and original debut
A sweeping adventure of identity, love and belonging (C Pam Zhang, Man Booker longlisted author of How Much of These Hills are Gold)
Brilliant and devastating. Four Treasures of the Sky tells the story of Daiyu, who is brought to America against her will and forced to hide who she is even as she grows into her true self. Weaving together myth and history, Zhang's work is both timeless and utterly necessary right now. (Anna North, author of the New York Times bestseller Outlawed)
An instant and necessary classic, easily among the best novels of this past decade. The story lingers long after its final pages (T Kira Madden, author of Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls)
An astonishing novel propelled by private and public histories, rich with reflections on self-making, moral calling, great love, and profound injustice (Megha Majumdar, author of A Burning)
This unforgettable novel dazzles. An exhilarating rush of character, history and storytelling (Kali Fajardo-Anstine, US National Book Award finalist author of Sabrina & Corina)
Brings alive a heroine for the ages, an indomitable teenage girl whose relentless spirit and self-reinvention carries this story. Daiyu is sure to take her place in the canon of great Western heroines next to True Grit's Mattie Ross (Juliet Grames, author of The Seven or Eight Deaths of Stella Fortuna)
This book is haunting, luscious and precise - it's historical fiction as we most want and need it to be. Four Treasures of the Sky paints a neglected chapter in history with sharp and devastating brushstrokes (Julia Fine, author of The Upstairs House)
A lyrical and sweeping Bildungsroman, fierce and moving
All stars
Most relevant
Based on true facts surrounding the Exclusion Act and anti-chinese sentinent of the 1800's. Both beautiful and awful, another sad time in American history that's been almost forgotten except by very few historians.
10/10 from me (on audible)

wow 10/10

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When I started listening I knew very little of the book, but I was enchanted by the story very quickly. It tells an uncomfortable tale of not just the life of the main character and the woman she was named after, but also a part of history that I did not know, which is important to be remembered

A great story, and an important one

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I enjoyed this book to start yet had a very difficult time finishing the book…even found myself skimming through at one point. I am sure some will enjoy but definitely not a book that I would recommend.

Not for me

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