This is book embodies a collection of personal tales that have bedeviled Tong's mind for years. The stories of two strong women who never met each other but who became the ancestors of the author and her husband, are presented at the beginning and the ending of the book. Between the tale of the Chinese Ng Shee, who established her family in San Francisco and the tale of the German Maria Korzelius, who kept only two of her seven children alive during epidemics, we find the stories of other strong women.

Into the familiar histories of World War One, World War Two, the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake, and several other current events, Tong has woven many stories that relate delightfully to the readers' own experiences.