Born into the grinding poverty of peasant life in the Chinese village of Lung Sun, Ah Pah had little expectation of ever venturing far from the village. But, orphaned at fourteen, Ah Pah joins a 'sisterhood' that changes the course of her life forever. Ironically, Ah Pah's solemn vows of celibacy and loyalty to her 'sisters' offer her a freedom unknown to most Chinese women of her time - financial independence. As a domestic servant, Ah Pah encounters worlds far beyond the experience of a simple peasant girl, from the cloistered luxury of the fabulously wealthy House of Tang in Canton, to the Hong Kong apartment of famous singer Little Peacock Lien; from the grim struggle for survival in Japanese-occupied Singapore, to the sometimes bewildering freedoms of present-day Australia.
