In 1989, shortly after the Tiananmen Square massacre, Su Xiaokang was smuggled out of China. Fu Li, his wife, a medical student, and their young son were left behind. After two years, the family was finally reunited in Princeton, New Jersey. For a short time it seemed that they had overcome more than they would ever have to face. But on June 4, 1993 -- exactly four years after Tiananmen -- while driving to Niagara Falls, their car sped off the road and Fu Li was horribly injured. When she emerged from a coma, unable to speak or control her limbs, the painful recovery process began.

Throughout this candid and moving memoir, we are made party to this man's innermost thoughts and feelings, his guilt and fear, bravery and strength, as he tells the story of his wife before and after the accident, and of how his life and his sense of himself is profoundly and forever changed.