Indie Publishers Association of Taiwan

We are all children. We are all mothers.

To loneliness and to the world.

A minimalistic picture book of emptiness and serenity.

When exhausted, we return to the Hotel of Childhood.

In life, there are many afters. After an event, and after another event, after and after…

We pass through countless entrances and exits. 

We journey through many afters and face many moments of the ego. 

After many afters, we return to nothing,

to the naught of childhood, and the naught of old age.

In many moments that seemed empty, or in face of the nitty gritty of everyday life, books offer the quickest shortcut to entrances and exits.  One can enter the world of solitude without feeling lonely at all.

After is the room that’s empty again and again, the womb that’s empty again and again.

“Back then, I was thinking of writing such a story.  After becoming a mother, I’ve not gone to beach on my own and I’ve not gone back to my childhood home. I focus on some very empty moments such as taking a shower, or seeing plants on balcony. Of course, in many moments I would recall my own mother and my own childhood.  Recall my mother’s laborious family life.  As I watched my mother toil for long hours in those years, during the period of time that seemed empty, I began to want to become a poet.”