Foreword by Janet Yellen

Weijian Shan's Out of the Gobi is a powerful memoir and commentary that will be one of the most important books on China of our time, one with the potential to re-shape how Americans view China, and how the Chinese view life in America.

China and the state of California have built deep and interdependent socioeconomic exchanges that reverberate across the globe, and these interactions make California a microcosm of the most important international relationship of the twenty-first century. In his book, journalist Matt Sheehan chronicles the real people who are making these connections. 

Moving beyond the standard framework of Cold War competition and national resurgence, Klaus Mühlhahn's new book situates twenty-first-century China in the nation’s long history of creative adaptation.