Twelve-year-old Tracy-or Tuyet-has always felt different. The villagers in Vietnam called her con-lai, or "half-breed," because her father was an American GI. And she doesn't fit in with her adoptive family in California, either. But when Tracy and a friend discover a soldier's dogtag hidden among her father's things, it sets her past and her present on a collision course. Where should her broken heart come to rest? In a time and place she remembers only in her dreams? Or among the people she now calls family? Partridge's sensitive portrayal of a girl and her family grappling with the complicated legacy of war is as timely today as the events were decades ago.

Author Biography

Elizabeth Partridge grew up in house full of dogs and cats, chameleons, fish, tortoises, and even a pet tarantula. Elizabeth was the first student to graduate with a degree in Women's Studies from the University of California at Berkeley, and later went to Great Britain to study Chinese medicine. She is the author of several books for young readers, including three biographies: Restless Spirit: the Life and Work of Dorothea Lange, This Land Was Made for You and Me: The Life and Songs of Woody Guthrie, and John Lennon: All I Want is the Truth. www.elizabethpartridge.com