"No one is an island, every book is a world."
This well-known phrase comes from Ga Zevin's novel The Island Bookstore.
As soon as the book was launched in 2014, it won the first place in the american independent bookseller's selection with an overwhelming number of votes, and sold well in more than 30 countries around the world.
When I first read this book, I thought it was just a description of the ups and downs of the protagonist, Fackley.
After many years of reading again, I found that this is a novel about life and redemption.
Escape, can not solve the problems of life
Nearly middle-aged Fickleri lives on the isolated Island of Alice and runs a bookstore.
Few people came to buy books, and the books on the shelves were all dusted.
Bookstores are in dismal business and on the verge of closure.
When the bookstore first opened a few years ago, it was the liveliest place on the island, and there was an endless stream of people coming to buy books every day.
At that time, Fickley and his wife Nicole ran a bookstore together, Nicole was easy-going and generous, and her eyes for picking books were very good, and the books she picked were loved by the people on the island.
Fickley looks at his beloved wife and the bustling bookstore every day, and his heart is full of happiness.
But this happy time did not last long, and fate gave Faikri a blow in the head.
While driving out, my wife had a car accident and left Fickleri.
Leaving with his wife, there is also a baby that is only 2 months old in the belly.
The departure of his wife and children struck a thunderclap on a sunny day.
He could not accept such a fact and fell into great sorrow.
He was like a changed person, very harsh and irritable to the people around him, indifferent to everything.
I eat quick-frozen food every day and barely survive. Borrow wine to dispel sorrows, get drunk and dream of death.
One night he was very drunk again, and in his drunken dream he felt his wife by his side, and he lay in her arms and smelled the familiar smell of her, still so warm.
Since then, he has been drinking even more uncontrolled.
Because he felt that as long as he was drunk, he could go back to the old days, he could see his wife, and he could deceive his wife and children that they never left him.
Like an ostrich, Faikri plunged headlong into the sand and paralyzed himself with alcohol. Endlessly lost in the grief of the past, unwilling to come out.
A psychologist said, "You can't solve a problem, you become a problem." ”
Faikri escapes the fact that his wife and children have died, not facing the pain of the past, and unwilling to start a new life.
And the problems of life cannot disappear automatically.
His life is a mess, and the pain of the past is dragging him down step by step.
He became a freak in the hearts of the island's inhabitants, and everyone respected him.
True strength is not forgetting but accepting
When Faikri's life came to an impasse, fate gave him a gift from the sky.
When he went home that day, he found a cute little girl in the bookstore.
She was sitting in front of the bookshelf, looking at the book with relish.
Faikri found a note on the girl that read, "This is Maya, two years and one month old." Her father couldn't show up in her life, and I was desperate. "It's Maya's mom.
Faikri instinctively rejected the girl and wanted to drive her away immediately.
But the night was already very dark, the police station was closed, and Faikri could not bear to throw Maya into the street, and was forced to take her in for one night.
Early the next morning, Faikri dropped Maya off at the police station.
The police were unable to find Maya's mother for a while and arranged for Maya to live at the police station, but Faikri was not at ease and continued to take her in for a week.
A week later, police told Faikri that Maya's mother had committed suicide by jumping into a lake and that, according to regulations, Maya would be sent to a welfare home.
Looking at Maya's innocent and lovely smile, Faikri was moved by compassion and decided to officially adopt her.
When news of Fakri's adoption of the little girl spread, the mothers on the island were worried.
They felt snobbish and indifferent, And Fickleri couldn't take care of a little girl.
But soon, the mothers realized that they were wrong.
Fickley took care of Maya with all his heart, and Maya had chickenpox, and he was able to take care of it for days without sleep.
He dressed up maya in a variety of ways, and Maya wore various skirts and a happy smile on her face.
The people on the island began to feel that Fikri had changed.
Before adopting Maya, Faikri hated children's books so much that he repeatedly scolded the sales of children's books that sold them to him.
And now, in order to let Maya see the books she wants to read, he has taken the initiative to contact those sales and buy a large number of children's books.
The appearance of the little girl Maya made Fakri no longer have a heart of stone and began to learn to pay without regard to returns.
Raising Maya also made him gentle and humble, and he began to open his heart and re-accept the people and things around him.
During his contact with the publisher salesman Amelia, he was attracted to Amelia and couldn't help but fall in love with her.
Soon after, he proposed to Amelia.
Faikri, Amelie and Maya, the three of them form a new family and live happily together.
There are no ups and downs in life.
Blindly escaping from reality and not facing it can only sink deeper and deeper in the bad quagmire and not see the light.
And learning to accept the new scenery in life can usher in a new life.
In this life, man will eventually learn to reconcile with fate
That morning, Fickley went out for a run as before.
But when I was about to get home, suddenly my eyes went black, and I fell to the ground and lost consciousness.
Faikri was taken to the hospital, where doctors found an uncommon tumor in his brain.
Faikri needed to have the surgery in a hurry, but he refused.
The seventy-two thousand dollars of treatment costs a sting in Fackley's heart, as much as the down payment on the house.
Faikri had always dreamed of buying his wife and daughter a house so they wouldn't have to live in the cramped bookstore loft.
Now he had saved enough money, but if he had surgery, this dream would be shattered.
When Amelia and Maya learned of the situation, they immediately arranged the operation for Fickley, telling Fickley, "We hate you more than the house." ”
Fickley walked into the operating room, but unfortunately, life is not a romantic TV series, and after the operation, Fickley did not recover and died a year later.
Nicole's death made Fickle lose his mind and give up hope in life.
However, when misfortune came again and Fickleri's own life came to an end, he seemed unusually calm.
He learned to face the suffering in his life calmly and no longer complain about the injustice of fate.
He found Amelia, who had a crush on him, in the crowd, and the two walked hand in hand to reach the last moments of his life.
He also met Maya, who made him a father at the most difficult time of his life, and he learned to love and understood love.
Before leaving, Fakri shook Maya's hand and said, "Maya, we will be what we love, and it is love that makes us." ”
Wang Xiaobo said: "We can't decide how to live and how to die, but we can decide how to love and how to live." ”
We can never guess the plot of fate, the next second is happiness, or misfortune will occur.
The only thing we can do is accept the imperfections of life and reconcile with every suffering.
Be brave to love, live hard, and chase the warmest and most sincere things in life with your heart.
In everyone's life, there is an incomparably difficult year, and it is that year that makes our lives incomparably beautiful and vast.
This quote from The Island Bookstore has healed countless readers.
In The most difficult year for Fickle, he accepted the Maya who fell from the sky, began to learn love, and was reconciled with fate.
We have all had the darkest moments of our lives, tormented by life and crushed by fate.
Reconcile with those who once clinged to the past, reconcile with those who have hurt themselves, and reconcile with the grievances they have endured.
For the rest of your life, may you and I have light in our eyes and love in our hearts.
Author | Qingyi, learn and learn from time to time, not to mention.
Image | Visual China, Network (if there is infringement, please contact to delete)