Amid the Cultural Revolution, Nina Huang says goodbye to her boyfriend, Dahai, who plans to join the Vietcong in the Vietnam War, and sneaks across the bay by boat to Hong Kong where she is granted political asylum in the United States. After her escape from mainland China and subsequent immigration to the U.S. and later to Canada, Nina's employment and education, and her experiences with romantic/sexual relationships, are a radical departure from the moral code she knew in China. Nina studies political science at an American university and finds herself constantly evaluating democracy and capitalism and critiquing communism. Twice during the time she is living in North America she travels back to China to to reunite with her mother as well as friends, and to see how Chinese society and politics are evolving. This becomes the predominant focus as she finally decides, as a journalist, to interview and record her contemporaries' experiences of life in China for a western...

The Long March Home tells the story of three generations of women. Agnes, a young Canadian goes to China as a missionary, and falls in love with a Chinese medical student. Growing anti-western sentiment forces her to return home to Nova Scotia, where she discovers she is pregnant. Meihua, their American-born daughter, travels to China in search of the father she never met and winds up marrying a Chinese man, but the Cultural Revolution tears their lives apart. With both parents imprisoned, it falls to the family's illiterate servant, Yao, to shield their daughter, Yezi, and her brother, from family tragedy, poverty, and political discrimination, negotiating their survival during the revolution that she barely understands. Only after her mother is released, does Yezi learn about her foreign grandmother, Agnes. Curious about her ancestry, Yezi travels to the U.S. to meet Agnes and learn about her life in China with the man her mother still longs to find.

Butterfly Tears is a collection of short fiction that depicts the experiences of Chinese immigrant women facing the challenges of life in a new country. The stories are set in different parts of China, Canada, and the United States and examine Chinese women's cross-cultural experiences in North America as well as women's issues and political discrimination in China. The stories, or parts of stories, set in China give the reader interesting glimpses into events such as the Cultural Revolution and Mao's death. In the title story, an ancient Chinese legend about two lovers and memories of a violinist who commits suicide during the Cultural Revolution haunt a young woman who fears her husband is having an affair. Leaving her abusive husband, a woman and her young son in A Beaten Mandarin Duck move to New Brunswick where they form a new family with a visiting professor from China. Twin Rivers tells the story of a female engineer who ends up in jail as a result of her love affair...