In Last Days of Old Beijing, Michael Meyers brought his readers into Beijing by blending his life and research; in In Manchuria, he transported readers to a region and walked them through its history. Now, in Into the Middle Country, Meyers invites us inside Communist China to travel and live with him in a country that became his home.
In 1995, at the age of 23, Michael Meyers joined the Peace Corp and, after rejecting offers to seven other countries, was sent to a tiny town in Sichuan, China. Unequipped but eager, Meyers wrote Chinese words up and down his arms so he would be able to hold conversations and jumped into explaining Beatles lyrics to his lighthearted students. In the twenty years that followed, Meyers spent sixteen years living, working, and seeking to understand China and its people. Now an expert on the country and on living in foreign lands, Meyers reflects on the unique moment he moved to China and the process of Westernization he witnessed in the years that followed.