Memories are like the air; love is the distance between two cities [referring to Karen Mok’s song]. This is not fictional love story, but the story of your own first love, so pure that it makes one in envy of your youth. Such an innocent love makes us constantly look back at a time that is bright and precious.
Back then, high schooler Zhang Yuan stared at her arrogantly. “Little miss, look up. Let Master, I, look at you carefully.” Back then, Zhang Yuan bashfully dodged He Luo’s claws. “Now you’re already my person, whether you’re flat or round, isn’t it all mine?” Back then, Zhang Yuan stood for 18 hours to come to Beijing. Travel-worn, he said, “You lazy girl, did you just wake up?” Back then, Zhang Yuan handed He Luo photos of her home(?). “I thought you would be the madam of the house.”
So effortless, so brave, so proud, even the last tear was filled with warmth. Thus, we refuse to grow old, like picking up a book and reading it over and over again. Thus, before we grow old, please savour this book, as if savouring memories of our own youth.
(Credit: C Novel Project)
[Ebook][Eng Translation Book 1][Mùa hạ thoáng qua][홀이금하][Google Drama with Eng Subs]
I found out about the book when I learned of the drama adaptation and it features Bai Yu hehe.
From my understanding, the protagonists, who were high school sweethearts, meet then break apart repeatedly during adulthood, as they face different career paths. I find “Suddenly this Summer” more realistic than the other stories of couples who reunite because in here, it’s not their family members or their class difference which separate them, it’s their dreams, in different countries, which put a wedge between them.
In spite of the realness, I felt so hollow when I read that the novel ends badly, with the typical “boy falls sick” when they have the opportunity to really commit to each other, and the boy going for the noble idiocy route. Thankfully, if it wasn’t for their friends, the girl would have been led to a false belief for the rest of his life. But the ending is bitterweet because the girl bears their child and the two of them live in the house the boy built for his and the girl’s family. But the drama has a good ending