The Good Earth Trilogy: The Good Earth, Sons, and A House Divided

The Good Earth: With luck and hard work, Chinese peasant farmer Wang Lung and his wife O-lan, a former slave, improve their fortune. They have sons and save steadily until one day they can afford to buy property in the House of Wang—the very house in which O-lan used to work. But success brings new problems. Wang soon finds himself the target of jealousy, and as good harvests come and go, so does the social order. Will Wang's family cherish the estate after he's gone?

Sons: Revolution is sweeping through China. Wang Lung is on his deathbed and his three sons stand ready to inherit his hard-won estate. One son has taken the family's wealth for granted and become a landlord; another is a thriving merchant and moneylender; the youngest, an ambitious general, is destined to be a leader in the country. Through all his life's changes, Wang did not anticipate that each son would hunger to sell his beloved land for maximum profit.

A House Divided: On the eve of a popular rebellion, the Chinese government starts to crack down in cities across the country. Fleeing the turmoil, Wang Yuan, the son of a famous general and grandson of the patriarch of The Good Earth, leaves for America to study agriculture. When he returns to China six years later, he encounters a nation still in the grip of violent uprisings. Unprepared for the social upheaval, Wang is torn by the tensions between old traditions and new ways, and by his formidable family, whose struggles he hopes to solve.