"dust".
This is Bai Yeling's first published book and also Song Yecheng's favorite. Even after that, he would buy every new book Bai Yeling published, read it carefully, and then put it in his bookcase. This book has always been the best in his heart.
This is a novel, but not a long novel in the usual sense. Instead, it connects together twelve independent yet hidden related stories that a speck of dust experiences as it drifts through the world from its perspective.
The film "Twins", which was filmed two years ago and won an award last year, was adapted from one of these stories. It tells the story of a pair of twins whose parents died tragically. They shared the same identity since childhood. When they grew up, one of them was obsessed with revenge, while the other clearly longed for a peaceful life but was forced to repeatedly create "alibi" for the other. In the end, due to the huge conflict of ideas and pursuits, one of them killed the other.
Until the end of the story, the book did not clearly state who the survivor was, and the film also retained this suspense, which makes the film itself full of topics worth discussing.
In addition, the "twin" setting where one person plays two roles provided Song Yecheng with a huge space to display his acting skills. In the end, it can be said that his winning of the Best Actor award for this film was well-deserved.
The film "Searching for the Light" to be filmed this time is also from this book and is adapted from the last story of this book. The reason why Song Yecheng did not realize this immediately when he heard the name last night is because the twelve stories in this book were not originally named separately, but were only divided into chapters.
"Twins" and "Searching for the Lantern" were both names specially chosen for the scripts after the stories were adapted into plays. So it was not until Song Yecheng saw the sentence "Adapted from Chapter 12 of Bai Yeling's novel "Dust"" in the introduction of the script of "Searching for the Lantern" that he suddenly understood which story it was about.
The curtains in the bedroom were not drawn. Song Yecheng opened the book in the soft light of the ceiling lamp and turned to Chapter 12 according to the table of contents.
The protagonist of this chapter is named Fang Zhi, a college student who came from a remote and backward area.
Because the mountain village where he grew up was deeply poisoned by feudal superstition, he suffered a lot of harm caused by superstition when he was young, so he has always been extremely disgusted with the stories of the supernatural.
In order to escape from such an ignorant environment, he worked hard to get into college and escaped from that remote and poor area.
However, such a person who had hated fate and ghosts since childhood, gradually believed in the existence of fate in the despair of a series of misfortunes in life when he grew up, and became obsessed with finding the whereabouts of a "magic lamp".
At the end of the story, Bai Ye Ling wrote this sentence:
"Gods are the product of despair. As long as there is even a shrine that can be redeemed by human power, it is natural that their shrines will be covered in dust forever."
Song Yecheng had read this story many times. After reviewing it again, he finally turned around and picked up the script beside him to read it.
Scripts adapted from short stories usually undergo relatively large changes. In addition to enriching the plot, many of the general narratives and psychological activities in the original text must be converted into more intuitive body language and expressions in order to be presented on camera.
More importantly, "Dust" was published in 2012, which is eight years ago. During these eight years, Bai Ye Ling's writing has been changing. Whether in terms of style, plot or depth, it is very different from that year. This difference will inevitably be reflected in the process of adapting the script.
After flipping through a few pages of the script, Song Yecheng quickly discovered Bai Yeling's changes to the story's entry point and timeline. When he was about to continue reading carefully, suddenly, the phone he had left casually on the bed rang.
The screen shows a WeChat video invitation:
[The most beautiful actress in autumn]
Song Yecheng raised his eyebrows, swiped the screen and clicked the answer button. Before the image appeared, he smiled and said, "Sister Qiu?"
The camera opposite shook for a long time before it stopped, and a face with a facial mask appeared on the screen. Although most of the features were blocked, it could be seen that this was undoubtedly a beauty just from the beautiful face shape and the pair of eyes that were exposed.
"Well, son." Qiu Mingyue leaned leisurely on the lounge chair by the swimming pool and took a glass of red wine from the side.
Song Yecheng glanced at the time: "What time is it over there? Why aren't you sleeping in the middle of the night?"
Qiu Mingyue is Song Yecheng's mother. She was once very popular in the film industry. Later, she won the Grand Slam of Best Actress awards at home and abroad. She thought that she had accomplished her mission and retired from the world without any regrets. She went abroad to become a TV program director and producer, which she was more interested in.
"It's been a while since we last met," Qiu Mingyue said, her eyes narrowed as she stared at the screen. "I have to see if my son has lost weight."
Song Yecheng smiled and said, "I thought you came to me for gossip after seeing the trending searches."
"Trending?" Far away on the other side of the ocean, Ms. Qiu hadn't been keeping up with the latest domestic gossip these days, but she quickly quipped, "Isn't it common for you to be on trending searches? What's the big deal?"
Even though she said that, she still asked with concern: "What's the reason this time?"
Song Yecheng said: "A group of photos were exposed, saying that Tang Yao and I were in a relationship."
"Tang Yao—" Qiu Mingyue dragged out her voice and recalled for a moment, "Oh, now I remember, the little girl is quite pretty. But I can't gossip about this, right? The gender doesn't match either."
Song Yecheng couldn't stop laughing. He had never hidden his sexual orientation from his parents. Ms. Qiu knew about it a long time ago. And unlike his father Song Sheng, she didn't have the stubborn suspicion of "how can you be sure of his sexual orientation when he has never been in a relationship", so she didn't interfere much in Song Yecheng's emotional issues over the years, and Song Yecheng had no pressure to talk about these things with her.
Qiu Mingyue smiled and asked, "What are you doing now? Why are you wearing a bathrobe in broad daylight and staying at home?"
"Yeah," Song Yecheng responded, "I'm reading the script."
Qiu Mingyue was a little surprised: "Why are you reading the script again? Didn't your dad say you needed to take a break for a while?"
Song Yecheng said, "I was originally planning to take a break, but Uncle Zhuang happened to have a good script, so I took it."
"What script?" Ms. Qiu had been acting for many years, so she was still curious when she heard about a good script. "Tell me about it?"
Song Yecheng said succinctly: "It's a story in "Dust", about finding a magic lamp."
Qiu Mingyue was stunned for a moment, then quickly reacted: "The one the fortune teller predicted?"
Song Yecheng smiled: "Oh, you have a good memory."
"How could that be bad?" Qiu Mingyue smiled helplessly, "Every time I go back to read your book, it's always by the bed. I've read it countless times."
"Dust" was published eight years ago and has been placed on Song Yecheng's bedside for eight years. At first, Qiu Mingyue thought that Song Yecheng had just thrown it there and didn't clean it up, so she kindly helped him put it in the bookcase. But the next time she went there, she found that it was back on the bedside.
After a few times, she finally couldn't help but flip through the book and unexpectedly found it quite interesting, so she bought a copy for herself.
Thinking of this, she smiled and sighed, "You really have your dad's personality. You never get tired of eating your favorite food, watching your favorite movies, and even reading a book over and over again. Oh, by the way, I remember you kept that letter for years, right? Do you still have it? Did you tear the paper apart after reading it?"
Hearing her mention this, Song Yecheng couldn't help but look in the direction of the wardrobe - there was a safe in the wardrobe, and there was nothing else in it except a letter that Song Yecheng received when he was twelve years old.
The content of the letter was very brief, and there were no sophisticated sentences worth pondering over and over again, but it was like a knot in his heart from his youth. He would put it under his pillow and take it out to read it again from time to time.
He read from twelve to twenty until the book "Dust" appeared and usurped its bedside throne, and it was finally put away and put into the safe.
"It's not broken, it's still here." Song Yecheng replied.
After saying that, he retracted his gaze and looked at the screen again. However, before Ms. Qiu on the other side could speak, the video call was forced to be interrupted due to an incoming call.
Seeing the name on the caller ID was "Director Zhuang", Song Yecheng was stunned for a moment, then quickly clicked the answer button: "Hello, Uncle Zhuang?"
Zhuang Yan's tone was a little hurried: "What's wrong with you? Didn't you just tell me not to tell anyone, and now it's on the trending search?"
"What hot search?" Song Yecheng was puzzled, but he didn't wait for Zhuang Yan to answer. He directly switched back to the home screen and clicked on Weibo.
The next second, he understood what Zhuang Yan was referring to. The latest entry was prominently displayed on the trending search list:
[Song Yecheng's "Searching for the Lantern"]
The first Weibo post I saw when I clicked on it was a screenshot of the catalog of "City and Field Chronicles", which clearly showed the latest chapter of the book that had just been released -
[Latest Chapter: Starring in "Searching for the Light", first released on February 21, 2020]
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