Looking at her father's globe, ten-year-old Jean Fritz knew she was on the wrong side of the world: in China when, of course, she should have been in America, roller skating.  Instead she was in a British school, trying to get out of singing "God Save the King."  She was worrying about the battle being waged across the river from Hankow.  And about the cook she suspected of trying to poison her.  This was a period of turmoil in China when foreigners were becoming more and more unpopular, when on a moment's notice, foreign women and children might be ordered to evacuate the city.

Yet there were many happy memories: picnics on the Great Wall, her friendship with her beloved amah, adventures with her best friend, Andrea.  Homesick as she may have been for America, Jean Fritz makes her love for China abundantly clear.

This story from Jean's childhood is filled with wonderful anecdotes seen from a child's perspective.  But it is more than a picture of growing up in China and going home to the country of her dreams, for Jean Fritz brings to life a real and unforgettable little girl who is lively and funny, curious and independent, and most of all, a perceptive observer and an enthusiastic doer.

From the dust jacket