Bitter Dumplings

This striking picture book ends with a new beginning for three people who never expected to be friends an orphaned girl cast out by her siblings, a slave escaping from a mighty emperors ship, and a hunchbacked old woman known for the bitter-melon and shrimp dumplings she brings to market each day and for living in a haunted house at the edge of the marshes. As their hardship-filled paths cross, each of their lives begins to change for the better, in a moving affirmation of the power of compassion.

Set long ago in a Chinese village by the sea, Jeanne M. Lees meticulously illustrated story has an extraordinary flavor all its own.