Green Island: A Novel

一場228浩劫，影響兩代，催化出一個痛苦的問題：
你會為你摯愛的人，付出多少？

　　1947年2月28日，在二二八事件震撼台北城時，蔡博士在午夜剛過、城市陷入戒嚴之際，迎來了他的小女兒。幾個星期後，中國國民黨採取行動，強力鎮壓反對派，蔡博士被迫就此遠離家人，成為成千上萬被擲下獄的受難者之一。

　　十幾年後，他回來了，卻被他所摯愛的家人視為異類，矛盾與衝突不斷陰森地現身在他與女兒間。而多年後，隨著小女兒遠赴美國，成為一個妻子與母親，她開始被迫分辨對錯，分辨採取什麼樣的行動才能拯救她的家庭：正如多年前，她親眼目睹父親所做的痛苦抉擇一樣。

　　故事橫跨六十年、兩大洲，敘事者的人生經歷日本結束數十年殖民地統治，並見證台灣成為一個真正民主國家的歷史進程。但，最重要的是，《Green Island》刻畫了一個感情豐沛的家庭，以及一個民族在複雜環境中生存拼搏的故事，並帶出一個發人深省的問題：你會為你所愛的人，付出多少？（文／博客來編譯）

　　A stunning story of love, betrayal, and family, set against the backdrop of a changing Taiwan over the course of the twentieth century.

 

　　February 28, 1947: Trapped inside the family home amid an uprising that has rocked Taipei, Dr. Tsai delivers his youngest daughter, the unnamed narrator of Green Island, just after midnight as the city is plunged into martial law. In the following weeks, as the Chinese Nationalists act to crush the opposition, Dr. Tsai becomes one of the many thousands of people dragged away from their families and thrown into prison. His return, after more than a decade, is marked by alienation from his loved ones and paranoia among his community—conflicts that loom over the growing bond he forms with his youngest daughter. Years later, this troubled past follows her to the United States, where, as a mother and a wife, she too is forced to decide between what is right and what might save her family—the same choice she witnessed her father make many years before.  

 

　　As the novel sweeps across six decades and two continents, the life of the narrator shadows the course of Taiwan’s history from the end of Japanese colonial rule to the decades under martial law and, finally, to Taiwan’s transformation into a democracy. But, above all, Green Island is a lush and lyrical story of a family and a nation grappling with the nuances of complicity and survival, raising the question: how far would you be willing to go for the ones you love?