Authors & Reviewers discussion

Struggle Between Two Lives
Release: January 29, 2022

"Cherish those you love while you still can, even if they might drive you crazy."

I ladled some into a bowl and took a spoon from the cutlery drawer. There were some daisies in a jar on the windowsill, something that my mother had continued since the first time I brought flowers home. I took the jar and placed it onto a tray beside the soup. In the garden, my father had straightened, but he did not turn around and look back at us, and I wondered if he was crying.

Xiao reached for my hand and squeezed it. She didn’t say anything but peered into my eyes, and I knew from her silence, that she was telling me to be strong, to be the good Chinese daughter my mother always wanted me to be.

My father barely spoke. He spent all his time downstairs in his office at the back of the restaurant, poring over numbers and scribbling in a huge wide ledger that was permanently open on his desk. Joseph came and went. He was staying with Lisa’s family because they had a large house with spare rooms, and they had welcomed Joseph with open arms. He was at medical school studying to be a surgeon, but he still played football and was fit and strong — he would make Lisa a great husband one day. But around our mother, he clammed up like a snail inside its shell and could barely even look at her without bawling.

https://www.amazon.com/Struggle-Betwe...