"China's generation after the 1980s is often labeled as a spoiled generation, while in fact most of them are alone and independent."
The remark was made by Guo Jing, an illustrator born in 1983 in Taiyuan, Shanxi province, whose illustrated children's book The Only Child was named Best Illustrated Children's Book of 2015 by the New York Times and listed among the Best Children's Books of 2015 by the Wall Street Journal for its vivid description of the feelings of an only child.
The story is of a small child who is left alone all day to fend for herself. One winter morning, as she misses grandma very much, she takes the No 25 bus to visit her. But she dozes off on the bus and wakes up in an unknown forest, a silvery fantasyland up in the clouds where she bonds with a flying deer, enormous whales and a seal pup. After a lot of wondrous experiences, a mysterious stag finally takes her to find grandma.
The little girl in the mystical-looking pencil drawings story is Guo herself as a child. At that time, she took the No 25 bus to go to see her grandma and brother on weekends and vacations.
"Every time when I left, grandma would send me to the bus station and watched me leave. My eyes get moist whenever I think of that," said Guo.
The warm memories of her childhood and an experience of getting lost at age of six or seven are the sources of inspiration for the story. By the end of 2012, Guo quit her job in Singapore and went back to China to start the drawings for the book. She took a year and a half finishing the over 100 wordless pages.
As one of the generation after the 80s, Guo is an only child due to China's birth control policy. She writes in an author's note that she belongs to "a very lonely generation." She said when she worked as a concept artist alone in Singapore, memories of childhood in her hometown Taiyuan often came to her.
I developed the book in hope of expressing my childhood memories of loneliness and longing for love and family affection, said Guo.
People usually say the generation is spoiled because of better living conditions and excessive love from the family, but Guo thinks that is not true.
"I saw independence, resolution, and strength from within my own growing experience and from that of my generation, now in their thirties. We have the courage and the pioneering spirit to face difficulties and deal with problems," Guo added. "Social environments change greatly for different generations, but care and companionship will enable children to grow happily in love."
Guo's book was published in the United States on Dec 1, 2015, and the CITIC Press Group is preparing publication of its Chinese edition.
