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Gr 5-8 In present-day rural China, 14-year-old Chu Ju's mother gives birth to her second child, another girl. When her grandmother makes plans to sell the baby, Chu Ju decides to leave home. Perhaps then her family will keep little Hua and her parents will try again for a boy. After finding work on a sampan and becoming like a daughter to the fisherman's wife, she tells her story, and the woman is so horrified that she wants her to return home immediately....Log In or Sign Up to Read More

A young girl from a rural village in southern China looks back on her four-year search for a home of her own. On the eve of the twenty-first century, China's policies for controlling its birthrate provide a convenient person-against-society conflict to set the plot in motion. Chu Ju is fourteen when her family's second daughter is born; her farmer parents need a son to inherit and work the land. As her grandmother plans to give the baby away, Chu Ju takes herself out of the equation by running away from home. Visualizing her schoolroom map of China, Chu Ju follows the river near her village, taking the reader on a tour ...Log In or Sign Up to Read More