Growing up in 1860s China, Tam Ling Fan has lived a life of comfort.
Her father is wealthy enough to provide for his family but unconventional enough to spare Ling Fan from the debilitating foot-binding required of most well-off girls. But Ling Fanās life is upended when her brother dies of influenza and their father
is imprisoned under false accusations. Hoping to earn the money that will secure her fatherās release, Ling Fan disguises herself as a boy and takes her brotherās contract to work for the Central Pacific Railroad Company in America.
Life on āthe Gold Mountainā is grueling and dangerous. To build the railroad that will connect the west coast to the east, Ling Fan and other Chinese laborers lay track and blast tunnels through the treacherous peaks of the Sierra Nevada, facing
cave-ins, avalanches, and blizzardsāalong with hostility from white Americans.
When someone threatens to expose Ling Fanās secret, she must take an even greater risk to save whatās left of her family ā¦ and to escape the Gold Mountain alive.