"Places like this have a history. Desires. And this one is famished and her mom are on the run after narrowly escaping the clutches of an abusive man who dragged them from Portland to Beijing. With fewoptions, Megan's mom turns to an old friend who offers them room and board in Huihuang Opera Theater in exchange for cleaning the ancient building. Between her rusty Mandarin and constant reminders thatshe's an outsider, Megan struggles with loneliness--until she meetsKristy, the glamorous young lead in the operatic adaptation of "TheMonkey King and the White Bone Demon". Soon, Megan's free time is split between reading a battered copy of the Chinese classic that inspired the opera and her budding new friendship; Kristy's love of singing brings out Megan's long-buried ambitions. But the opera house has its secrets. There are passages within the walls that shouldn't be there, and the more Megan delves into that old book, the more the myths begin to bleed into real life. As Megan finds it increasingly difficult to separate reality from folklore, she must uncover a decades-old mystery to discover the true, horrifying secret of the operahouse before it casts its hungry eyes on her"--