Tea girl from Hummingbird Street

A novel about traditions, tea cultivation, and the bonds between mothers and daughters from the bestselling author of The Secret of the Silk Fan.

In a remote Chinese mountain village, the Li-jen family has been growing tea for generations. Their time is governed by the passing of the seasons, but with the arrival of the first car in the village, the modern world opens up to the people.

Li-jen, the daughter of the village's most respected family, defies the traditions that are supposed to shape her life. She gives birth to an illegitimate daughter, whose life she saves by abandoning her in an orphanage in a nearby town, and leaves for education and a better life.

Growing up happily in California with an adopted family, little Hayley is still interested in her roots. The only clue to her origins is a cake made from a special tea her mother left with her at the orphanage.

Across the ocean, Li-jen longs for her lost daughter. Both are dedicated to the study of the precious pchu-er tea that has determined their family's destiny for centuries.

The colourful backdrop of Lisa See's novel is the fading world of traditional Akha mountain life in a harsh and remote part of southwest China. It is hard to imagine that at the end of the 20th century the inhabitants did not know electricity, cars or telephone. Life on the tea mountains was and is firmly tied to a special kind of tea, pchu-er, which almost fell into oblivion in the turbulent years after the emergence of Red China.

But green gold has received renewed attention in the 21st century, and interest in pchu-er has dramatically changed the lives of everyone who comes into contact with it.