Great Wall of China

Beicheng was a small town built on the Great Wall of China. It was a small town with many poor families, but there was one family who worked hard to survive, they were the Li’s. They had two jobs, acrobats and also they ran a noodle stall. They got paid very little. In their family is Li Hu, main character, Li Mei, Li San, Hu’s mother and Ah Po. Beicheng was under threat of Barbarians. What is even more dangerous is that the Great Wall is crumbling. Until later in the story, Hu meets Zheng Ren, the son of Commander Zheng. They were part of the tiger battalion. Even though Hu was a peasant and Ren was loyalty, they were still friends. They first meet when Hu was practising archery.

Hu’s life as a peasant is tough with ‘high smells and low rent’, as said in the book. Hu has a close relationship with his father. Because Hu was good at archery he entered an archery competition with Ren, but his father grounded him.

Ren has a privileged life with silk clothes and jewellery on his fingers. Other than Hu, Ren has a distant relationship because his father is a Commander and is very busy. His friendship Hu develops over time. Ren wants to prove something to his father so he sneaks out to the archery competition. Ren and Hu take risk in trying to achieve their dreams.

Magistrate Ding is the main banker of Beicheng and Master Wang is a tutor. They are both in positions of power but are both messing up the money and supply side of Beicheng. The mishap between Master Wang and Magistrate Ding leads to consequences for Hu and Ren. When Ren gets in trouble the Commander ships him to Wuzhong with Master Wang and he threatens to sell Ren because he knows their secret.

Hu and Ren show resourcefulness and courage in their death defying events. Ren returns to Beicheng to tell the Commander about Master Wang’s secret, he gets Hu alone to say he is sorry for leaving him in Beicheng but Hu says he can’t forgive