Meet Emily Murdoch, who lives with her parents and her two sisters in Victoria, B.C., in 1896. On the other side of Victoria's James Bay Bridge is Chinatown, a world as different from Emily's as can be. Thousands of Chinese immigrants looking for a better life in Canada call it home, including Hing, Emily's family's cook. For Emily, the lure of Chinatown proves to be irresistible. One afternoon, on an adventure with her friends, she gets lost in its teeming streets. Now she is about to learn much more about Hing's life-and something more about her own.