Daiyu had a happy life with her parents and her grandmother, by the sea, until one day her parents disappeared. Her grandmother is pretty sure they've been arrested (which does prove out) and aren't coming back. She tells Diayu that she can get by, but Daiyu would be better off going to the town nearby to find work, or she might also be arrested and also it'd be very hard for both of them to find food. To protect herself, a small girl along in a town, Daiyu pretends to be a boy. Eventually she finds work sweeping up at a calligraphy school, where she also eavesdrops and learns so much, she becomes better than some of the (all male) students. One day, a kind man helps her out and takes her out for lunch. Nope, not kind at all. He kidnaps her. She's locked in a tiny room and taught English for a year, and then she's stuffed in a barrel full of coal and put on a ship to San Francisco. From there, she's forced into prostitution, escapes, and goes to Idaho where she works in a store.

Through all this, Daiyu takes us on a broad tour of how some Chinese got to American in the 1880s, and what the very limited and dangerous options could be. Racism was rampant here, despite the Chinese being valued for their physical work, and idealized for their sexuality. The Chinese gangs in America were almost as dangerous as the white racists. Diayu has a real knack for survival which makes her a great heroine. This is a truly fascinating story, and a period of history, and a people in America, I was not overly familiar with, despite being a big fan of historical fiction (and history). This felt fresh and new. A sweeping, tragic story of one young woman's experience, giving a glimpse into what this must have been like for thousands like her.

This book is published by Flatiron Books, a division of Macmillan, my employer.