Bette Bao Lord is the wife of the American ambassador to China. At the beginning of the book, her husband is preparing to leave China. Bette is going to stay on in China for a short time. She is reflecting on their time in China and she also shares portions of interviews with a variety of people in China from all classes and professions.

Their reminiscences are particularly revealing about China and the Chinese culture. The candid nature of the interviews requires that Lord disguise her informants but the book does include information about the characters in Eighth Moon: The True Story of a Young Girl's Life in Communist China, (1964).

By piecing together the family tree, it is possible to figure out that some of the informants are actually family members. For example, "the returned student" is really the story of Lord's maternal grandfather, and Ah Yee is...