"And believing in ghosts - that's believing that love never dies. If people we love die, then they are lost only to our ordinary senses. If we remember, we can find them any time with our hundred secret senses.." --Olivia in Amy Tan, The Hundred Secret Senses
The Third novel by Chinese-American novelist Amy Tan. Unlike The Joy Luck Club and The Kitchen God's Wife , which largely deal with the relationships of American Daughters and their Chinese mothers, The Hundred Secret Sense examines the enduring nature of love.
The novel tells the tale of Olivia, whose childhood was haunted by ghosts from the stories her Chinese Half-Sister Kwan would tell her at night, and whose relationship with her husband Simon is haunted by the spectre of his old lover who died mysteriously. Kwan believes that she has "yin eyes" which allow her to see and speak to the dead.
After Olivia and Simon separate, Kwan conspires to reunite them. The three take a trip to China where an intricate and magical story unfolds. As Kwan tells a tragic tale from the past, Olivia realizes certain truths about her relationship with Simon and the nature of love itself.