Once Upon a Time in the East (book)

Once Upon a Time in the East is a memoir by Chinese-born British Xiaolu Guo. The book is titled "Nine Continents: A Memoir In and Out of China" in the United States.
Summary.
Guo's memoir begins with her as a newborn, when she was given to another couple by her parents. The couple raised Guo in a mountain village, which is where she remained at until she was 2 years old when the couple gave Guo to her grandparents. Guo lived with her grandparents in the fishing village Shitang until she was 7 years old. As a child, Guo was in constant hunger and she later met her birth parents when she was 12 years old. Guo lived with her parents at a communist compound. The memoir also documents her time in London after moving there in 2002.
Background.
Guo decided to write the book because her friends said that her previously published writings about her childhood "were amazing". Her novel "Village of Stone" was partially based on her life. Guo thought that it would be hard to write the book, but she said that "it was the quickest book" that she has written. It was most difficult for Guo to write about her early life.
The book is titled "Nine Continents: A Memoir In and Out of China" in the United States.
Reception.
A review in "The Scotsman" compared this book with "Dear Friend, From My Life I Write To You In Your Life" by Yiyun Li, stating, "But the differences are more deep-structured than superficial, in that Guo and Li represent two sides of an almost perpetual literary dichotomy; the Romantic and the Classical. Although Li writes movingly and affectingly about her own circumstances – the essays were born out of two spells in hospital for depression and speak openly about suicide – she writes towards a kind of selflessness".
The book won the 2017 National Book Critics Circle Award for Best Autobiography.