Six Words, Many Turtles and Three Days in Hong Kong

This timely if uneven photo-essay invites readers to spend a weekend in Hong Kong with Tsz Yan, an eight-year-old Chinese girl. Tsz Yan does homework, goes with her parents to a dim sum restaurant, visits relatives, is treated to a trip to a big amusement park, etc. The foreign setting comes through most immediately in Drinker's vivid photos, which range from informal snapshots of Tsz Yan, her family and friends to tempting views of markets and food stalls to aerial panoramas. McMahon (Summer Tunes: A Martha's Vineyard Vacation) sets an ambitious agenda: to show how Tsz Yan is not so different from American readers while demonstrating what is unique about her milieu. The text is organized around Tsz Yan's assignment to memorize six English words, with the author repeatedly (and sometimes awkwardly) working the words into the narrative: ""Tsz Yan knows she is not HAPPY when she is HUNGRY."" Efforts to situate the story within the changing political climate of Hong Kong are generally unsuccessful; for example, it's unlikely that the target audience will grasp the significance of Tsz Yan's parents' uncertainty whether or not ""a Chinese person living in Hong Kong [will be] the same as a Chinese person living in China."" The whole enterprise is just a little too long to sustain the reader's interest. Ages 7-12. (Aug.)