The Northern Tomb

The Northern Tomb tells the story of Mr Zhao, an elderly widower, and Sister Fu, his middle-aged carer, being in isolation together in Shenyang, a capital city in Northeast China, during the Covid pandemic. Weighed down by loss and private sorrow, the unlikely housemates protect and care for each other in ingenious ways as they come to terms with their own painful pasts. Structured as a quartet, narrated in multiple voices with different perspectives, this novel explores the depth of grief, the possibility of redemption, while testifying to the transformative power of friendship during difficult times. It also contemplates aging, illness, and the meaning of caring for the body. With a small cast of characters the novel provides an intimate portrayal of parental love and sibling dynamics, and reveals family legends and myths as inheritance, patterns of fate running through generations, and individual's struggles amid the tidal waves of history.