The Little Girl
Phil Wong, Fenlin Lee
Hardcover
(New Earth Enterprises Llc, May 1, 2008)
One little girl can change your life forever.In The Little Girl, a Chinese bachelor adopts an abandoned baby. He raises her, experiencing the joys and trials of fatherhood. As the girl comes of age, the father realizes that he can't take care of his daughter forever, so he arranges a marriage for her. He suffers through a deep time of loneliness but in the end is rewarded.Each vignette, beautifully illustrated by Fenlin Lee, moves the reader through the rhythms of ordinary life: work, play, mealtime, gift-giving. When viewed over the characters' lifetime, the extraordinary comes to light and father and daughter show themselves to be heroic. Hovering nearby, usually out of sight, is the greater hero who assures children everywhere that someone is always watching over them.Author Phil Wong's personal experience with orphans inspired The Little Girl. The son of Chinese immigrant parents, Wong adopted two boys from Vietnam, and was indelibly moved by the orphans he had to leave behind. He also wrote the book in response to China's sociological crisis: millions of baby girls in China are abandoned due to the one-child policy and a cultural preference for sons. This has led to a gender imbalance that threatens China. New Earth Enterprises plans to market The Little Girl in China, hoping to turn the hearts of mothers and fathers to their daughters and to equalizing the gender imbalance in coming generations.The Little Girl is intended for a variety of audiences. Adoptive families will find the story unique among children's books about adoption because it is set entirely in China, seamlessly affirming adoptive children without forcing upon them the anxieties that multiracial families often expect. Educators will value the depiction of everyday Chinese life. Parents will resonate with the story's poignant pictures of loss and redemption. Children will see themselves reflected in the daily adventures of the little girl.
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