These two novellas by one of China's most prolific writers paint a picture of life in Shanghai and all the turmoil that comes with it.

Shanghai is one of the cities in China that has been exposed to a great deal of outside influences throughout its history. The author, with a keen eye for observation, has chiseled out the life of common city dwellers in its alleyways from the 1980s to the 1990s in these two stories.

Through the perspective of Gu Longfei, also nicknamed Black Bug, the leading character, River Under the Eaves follows the family through three generations.

In Jiqing Li, Xiaoyu lives in a new residential area of Shanghai, has a good job and a handsome boyfriend. She then rents a small room on Jiqing Li, desiring to live a truly elegant life in Shanghai. But all is not what it seems and her life heads for turmoil.

Behind these stories is the gap between the cities and countryside, the legacy of the political upheavals of the past, and the price that has come with new found prosperity. The people who resided in the stone gate houses represented the rapidly changing dynamics of the Shanghai metropolis.