num_pages: 440
description: In the last years of the Tang Dynasty, a beautiful girl is born in a fort along the Great Wall of China, and is set to become the most famous and celebrated courtesan of her age. Set in the 9th century, Passing Under Heaven tells the tragic love story of Lily, and documents a time when Chinese women enjoyed a window of unprecedented personal freedom—including the freedom to fall in love. But when Lily pushes that freedom to its limits, disaster ensues, leaving her child and husband to forever mourn her loss. Based on historical fact, Passing Under Heaven is more than the story of the end of a love affair, but also a chronicle of the passing of the Chinese golden age into civil war and ruin.
language: English
title: Passing Under Heaven
titlecomplete: Passing Under Heaven
genres: Fiction, Poetry, China, Historical Fiction
ratings_count: 142
awards: awardedAt: 1104566400000
name: Somerset Maugham Award, awardedAt: 1104566400000
name: RSL Encore Award
publisher: Little, Brown Book Group