The Moon Represents My Heart

Advance Praise forTHE MOON REPRESENTS MY HEART‘I fell in love with this book and the Wang family from the very first page. A beautiful exploration of family, love and loss across the generations, it gives a fresh, fun spin on the time travel genre combined with a heartrending immigrant story. I didn’t want it to end. Pim has a unique voice.’ Gemma Chan, actor, writer, producer‘Poetic, beautiful, and moving, The Moon Represents My Heart is unforgettable.’ Louise O’Neill, author of Idol‘Bold, experimental, and beautiful, The Moon Represents My Heart might break your heart, but it’ll also put it back together again. A sweeping tale across the fabric of time, countries and cultural borders, and family ties, this book is a rumination on how grief can keep you trapped in the past, but there’s always the hope to move forward once again.’ L.R. Lam, co-author of Seven Devils‘As propulsive as it is moving, The Moon Represents My Heart is an enchanting tale of family and heartbreak.’ Jing-Jing Lee, author of How We Disappeared‘The Moon Represents My Heart…was an immediately compelling, unusual story with a totally fresh voice – a fascinating story of love and time travel, full of mystery and heart.’ Jennifer Saint, author of Ariadne‘Masterfully plotted, poetic, and captivating, The Moon Represents My Heart establishes Pim Wangtechawat as a rising star from South-East Asia’s rich literary heritage.’ Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai, author of The Mountains Sing‘An utterly mesmerising and poetic debut filled with characters that feel like family, that shatters your heart and pieces it back together beautifully. The Moon Represents My Heart is truly an exceptional piece of literature.’ Elvin James Mensah, author of Small Joys‘An extraordinary debut. Pim Wangtechawat creates a magical tale of love, loss and yearning, full of poetic prose and powerful insight. This novel breaks your heart yet gives you hope – and it features the best Bruce Lee cameo in contemporary fiction!’ D.V. Bishop, author Ritual of Fire‘In The Moon Represents My Heart, Pim Wangtechawat paints an emotional and panoramic portrait of a family as united by their gift as they are tested by it. Intimate, tender, and imaginative, this novel takes the reader on a time-traveling adventure while imparting the wisdom of how cherished and truly priceless time is.’ Katherine J. Chen, author of Joan‘A tender and transformative debut, with the Wang family as its beating heart. Wangtechawat captures love in all its many forms.’ Grace D. Li, author of Portrait of a Thief CONTENTS The Wang Family Tree Part One: All things are difficult at the start Part Two: An inch of time is worth an inch of gold, but an inch of gold may not buy an inch of time Part Three: Wait till the clouds part to see moonlight Acknowledgements About the Author For my father and grandfathers,who gifted me this story.And for my mother and grandmothers,who gave me its wings. ‌THE WANG FAMILY TREE You ask me how deep my love for you is,how much I really love you.My affection does not waver,my love will not change.The moon represents my heart.TERESA TENG, ‘The Moon Represents My Heart’ ‌PART ONE万事开头难All things are difficult at the start Everyone who time-travels describes their experience differently.For a scientific and extremely logical man like Joshua Wang, it is merely ‘a dark, swooping sensation’ – a ‘blip’ in time in which your body is simply uprooted from the ground before appearing somewhere else. His wife Lily, more artistic and romantic by nature, compared it to the feeling you get when you realise for the first time that you’re falling in love – ‘a kind of thrill’, ‘a rush of adrenaline’. Like when you’re hurtling towards the ground on a roller-coaster ride, terrified, but incredibly, wonderfully alive. Their son, Tommy, compared it to an exquisite football goal – a volley from outside the penalty box or a curving strike delivered from halfway down the pitch when the goalkeeper is off his line. His twin, Eva, did not use words at all. She painted instead: a gorgeous sunset over a rippling blue ocean, a dark rainforest, with shadows lurking everywhere.But despite these differing descriptions, all time travellers seem to agree on one thing: the experience comes with a sense of profound vulnerability. A loss waiting to happen. As Lily liked to put it, ‘You are holding something precious in your hands but are afraid that one day it will slip through your fingers. And that no matter how hard you try, you can never have it back.’ JOSHUA, LILY, TOMMY AND EVA1972 / 2000The last time the Wangs travelled back in time together as a family, the twins, Tommy and Eva, were eight years old. Joshua, their father, and Lily, their mother, were both thirty-one.The trip was to Hong Kong on 21 March 1972, to meet Joshua’s idol, Bruce Lee, the night before the premier of his film Fist of Fury.At around five in the evening, precisely as planned, in a narrow, secluded alley by the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Kowloon, the Wangs appeared out of thin air, quiet as a breeze. Not one by one, but together, holding each other tightly by the hand.They were all dressed in the seventies-style clothes that Lily had meticulously prepared over several months so that they would resemble ‘the sort of wholesome, upper-class Chinese family that wouldn’t look out of place in a fancy hotel’.For a while they stood conversing with each other in low voices, the parents bending down to make sure that there was colour in their children’s cheeks, that their hands and legs weren’t shaking or trembling from the trip. After all, they were still new to time travelling. How are you feeling? they asked over and over again in hushed whispers. Are you okay?Eventually, the four of them made their way to the hotel’s entrance. After a nod from Joshua, they walked through the double doors as if they were guests there, passing the doorman, who doffed his cap at them, and the two concierges guarding