For many of her formative years, Ji-Li, is growing up in a moderately free world where dreams are possible if you dream them hard enough, however, this childhood ends abruptly in the mid-1960s, and dreams, just like everything else, have a tendency to be rationed by the brand new Chinese Communist government.
One day, Ji-Li is selected to audition for the Liberation Army Dance Troupe. This is an honor, and the auditions are known to be very competitive. Excited, she runs home to tell her family, but her parents are not excited at all, and her father tells her that she will never be selected for the Troupe because she will not pass the background check. This confuses her. She doesn't understand what her father means at all. She tells her teacher the next day that their earlier enthusiasm should be tempered. This news seems to coincide with the changing of the familiar world; it is not just her father's cryptic comment that is confusing, but everything. It is the Cultural Revolution and Chairman Mao is obsessed with getting rid of everything that has gone before. His is a philosophy of "out with the old" before he has even begun to "bring in the new". Suddenly all of their old teachers are the subject of terrible epithets and their knowledge is rejected. Bookstores are closed, and all of her old textbooks are destroyed.
When it becomes common knowledge that Ji-Li's grandfather was once a landlord, her family become persona non grata about town. The rich are the new personification of evil in Mao's China, and even being related to someone who was rich several generations ago is considered subversive and socially unacceptable. It doesn't seem to matter to the community that her grandfather has been dead for quite a few years - he is still a relative. Ji-Li's home is ransacked and her father taken away and imprisoned for no reason at all. Mao's New China is ruining her life, but outwardly she tries to support it. She is asked to make a presentation about Mao at a prestigious educational exhibition and she is very excited because the experience reminds her of the way things used to be; she's still one of the smartest kids in the class and she still enjoys her studies. She gives a much-lauded performance, but it is all for nothing when government officials approach her at the end of her presentation and tell her that they want her to give evidence against her father at his upcoming trial. Nobody can tell her what her father is supposed to have done, but she is required to confirm that whatever it was, he did it. This is a step too far for Ji-Li. She believes in the revolution but she is not prepared to lie about her father and get him in trouble. She refuses; she is suspended from school and soon kicked out all together. She is sent to work in the fields where conditions are inhumane, and she is separated from her family.
When her punishment time is up, she is allowed to return home, but when she does she learns that her mother has written a letter of complaint to the government. All of Ji-Li's experiences tell her that this is not something that will be well received; Communism does not allow for complaints. The Red Guards come to the house and find the letter, also beating up Ji-Li's grandmother. Ji-Li is now in charge of the family. She is ordered to work as a street-sweeper. Almost all of their possessions are stolen by the government. Ji-Li is depressed, but now, opposed to the revolution, is able to focus on getting through each day, working for the good of her family, and knowing that family is what is really important in life because without each other they have nothing.
We meet Ji-Li again thirty years after the revolution destroyed their lives. Her father was kept in prison without a trial for a long time. His release was a happy occasion for the family, but they could never get back the time with each other that was stolen from them. For a while, they suffered, but when they managed to escape China, and settle in America, the family's life improved.
