A baby is born to the Chinese-Canadian Huangs in Fort Michel, Ontario; assigned male and the name Peter at birth.
Playing with her three sisters, Adele, Helen, and Bonnie, she understands early on that she is a girl and aspires to embody the femininity her sisters are easily allowed. She struggles in her relationship with her father, a dictatorial, patriarchal man who is committed to eradicating his family's Chinese heritage and shaping her into an "ideal Western man."[1][2]
At age 18, Huang moves away from home and to Montreal, where she works in restaurants and leads a lonely life. She has affairs with two older women, the first an abusive mother of a casual friend, and the second a Christian evangelist trying to purge herself of lesbianism.[3]
The book ends with her joining her sisters in Germany, and her true name being revealed: Audrey.
