The Girl Who Counted Everything

She is seven years old, she cannot read, and she has just understood something no one around her ever says out loud: her life is already written, and she will not be the one holding the brush.

Northern Song dynasty. In a village where everyone shares the same surname, a peasant girl has no schooling, no property, no say in her marriage, and no inheritance. Miao'er knows this. She spends her childhood crouched beneath a schoolroom window, stealing lessons meant for boys and learning something more useful still: how to count. Prices. Debts. Silences. The number of days between her mother's rages.

There will be 58 chapters. Two per week.