In the grand historic background of the Age of Discovery, a beautiful Chinese woman traveled to Southeast Asia. The tsunami deprived her of her memories. She was drifted from place to place in the oceans and on the islands. She was bullied and deserted. She has undergone birth-giving, pains of illnesses, and sufferings of being jailed. She pierced her eyes blind just in order to find her lost memory. She is willing to spend her entire life on seeking her past. Chunchi finally did not find the shell which harbored her memories in the sea, but she did not cast her stories away in the vast realm. Someone has talked about seeing a blind woman in the ruins of an old town. She, like a bird, gently passed by the dead on the ground, picking up the shells scattering by their sides or grasped in their hands. The soldiers who assaulted the shell cities all have seen this woman dancing on the beams of the fallen houses and on the dead, with her red feet on her tiptoes. She blindfolded the eyes of the sick children, guiding them to read the shells which were filled with happy memories, driving the sickness out of them. She was regarded as a holy woman. She was the richest woman in the world. The destinies of pirates, singsong girls, eunuchs, heads of tribes and western priests have converged in the beautiful sceneries of Southeast Asia.

The blind woman Chun Chi has a secret. Accompanied only by her The Memory Is So Beautiful That We Will Crash Soul for It adopted son Xiao Xing and a eunuch, she lives in a crumbling house stacked with boxes of seashells. But what does she hope to gain from them? Why does she keep going out to sea? How did she lose her sight? Seeking answers, Xiao Xing goes on a quest to uncover her past, which takes him on a journey far from home and into the jungles of Java. Set in the early fifteenth century, when Ming Emperor Yongle sent fleets of Chinese ships to explore Southeast Asia, entangling the two regions, The Promise Bird flits between the frozen north Chinese winter and the blazing heat of the tropics. An uncompromising novel about devotion that borders on obsession, and a love that tips into madness.