More than two thousand years ago, with his land under constant attack from
nomads, the First Emperor of China came up with a simple solution: build a wall
to keep out enemies. It was a wall that kept growing and growing. But its
construction came at a huge cost: it is believed that more than a million
Chinese died building it, earning the wall its nickname--the longest cemetery on
earth. Through the story of the wall, Patricia Brennan Demuth is able to tell
the story of China itself, the rise and fall of dynasties, the greatness of its
culture, and its present-day status as a Communist