Shanghai, 1937. Pearl & May are two sisters from a bourgeois family. Though their personalities are very different
- Pearl is a Dragon sign, strong & stubborn, while May is a true Sheep, adorable & placid
- they are inseparable best friends. Both are beautiful, modern & living a carefree life until the day their father tells them that he has gambled away the family`s wealth, & that in order to repay his debts he must sell the girls as wives to two ` Gold Mountain` men: Americans. As Japanese bombs fall on their beloved city, the two sisters set out on the journey of a lifetime, one that will take them through the villages of southern China, in & out of the clutches of brutal soldiers, & even across the ocean, through the humiliation of an anti-Chinese detention centre to a new, married life in Los Angeles` Chinatown. Here they begin a fresh chapter, despite the racial discrimination & anti-Communist paranoia, because now they have something to strive for: a young, American-born daughter, Joy. Along the way there are terrible sacrifices, impossible choices & one devastating, life-changing secret, but through it all the two heroines of this astounding new novel by Lisa See hold fast to who they are
- Shanghai girls.