Lost in China - by Jennifer F Dobbs (Paperback)

About the Book

Lost in China is the true story of two young children stranded in Western China during World War II.

Book Synopsis

Selected as one of Kirkus Reviews' Best Indie Books of 2022.

Winner of 2023 Feathered Quill Book Award for Memoir/Biography.

Winner of Memphis Public Libraries' 2022 Richard Wright Literary Award for Adult Nonfiction.

It's November 1941. Siblings Jennifer and John, ages seven and five, huddle in a cement culvert near Kunming, China, while Japanese Zeros fly overhead. Jennifer pretends to ignore the screech of gunfire. Where are Daddy and Mummy? she thinks.

Lost in China is the true story of two Anglo-American children separated from their parents in China during World War II, and their unforgettable journey to America a year later. The Dobbs family lived in Shanghai in the late 1930s, where the children spoke Mandarin and Jennifer rode to school in a rickshaw. As war progresses, the family travels to heavily bombed Chungking, through mountains harboring bandits, and on the dangerous Burma Road. When their mother and father fly to Hong Kong on a short trip and get caught up in the Japanese attack, the Dobbs children are left parentless, with no idea when their parents will return-or if they are even still alive.

For a year, the children remain in Western China, and the two are separated when John is taken to stay with another family, where he survives a near-drowning incident. Finally, after spending a month traveling three-quarters of the way around the world via the US military's World War II ferry routes, they reunite with their mother in a rain-swept, deserted airfield in Washington, DC-and face a shocking discovery about their father. Lost in China is both a riveting firsthand account of a family broken apart in World War II China and a daughter's tribute to her beloved father.

Review Quotes

"We may find elements of Dobbs's childhood odyssey in other tales, but rarely assembled in one true story like this. From our first glimpse of a stained wooden box holding family secrets, we are immersed-by her side as she and her brother cross interior China and journey onward to the United States. We are with them as they flee aerial bombs and sway up steep ridges on sedan chairs in the pitch dark. Even against the stark realities of a world at war, one senses Dobbs's love for China in unexpectedly charming scenes: water buffalos in rice paddies; market day among ethnic minorities; traversing a suspension bridge made entirely of woven bamboo as her father, to whom the memoir is dedicated, snaps photos on his Leica. All in all, a unique and compelling read." -Claire Chao, Writer's Digest Grand Prize Winner and author of Remembering Shanghai: A Memoir of Socialites, Scholars and Scoundrels

"[Dobbs's] reminiscence is simply extraordinary-historically edifying, emotionally dramatic, and elegantly conveyed. A gripping memoir brimming with personal and historical insight." -Kirkus Reviews

"Readers will be immediately swept into Dobbs's world from the first pages of this breathtaking story and inundated with the sights, sounds, and smells of a China few would otherwise experience: rickshaws scoot around the landscape, the waters of the Yangtze flood up past the river's banks, and street vendors hawk mouthwatering cuisine like sugarcoated haws and dried plum candy. . . . Fans of coming-of-age memoirs rich with period and cultural detail and the tumult of the twentieth century's wars will enjoy this engaging, informative read." -BookLife

"This is a story of a child and of a journey. At its heart, it is the tale of how two young children in China, having had their mother trapped by war in Hong Kong and their father killed there, crossed a world in conflict. Jennifer Dobbs tells her singular and moving story, summoning impressions and memories of a childhood in China, a family shattered, and a father lost." -Robert Bickers, associate pro vice-chancellor for postgraduate research, professor of history, University of Bristol

"As one personal account of the damage done to families in Asia by the Second World War, Lost in China speaks for millions." -Dr. Tony Banham, author of Not the Slightest Chance