Title: Big Tiger and Christian
Description: Two boys decide to play hooky and go kite-flying, and since this is Peking in the early 1920's, it rapidly becomes an adventure.  Big Tiger and his European friend Christian wind up trapped on a speeding troop-train, rescued by a famous warlord, and then sent by him on a secret mission into remote, mysterious Mongolia.  Their companions are a friendly but larcenous noncommissioned officer and a merchant who isn't at all what he claims to be.  Along the way, the boys meet bandits, herdsmen, lamas -- and a clever Mongol girl and her extraordinary poodle.

This is a WONDERFUL book.  Although it is classified as a YA novel, any adult will read it with pleasure.  The author spent years in China and Mongolia, and writes sympathetically but accurately of the people and conditions the two boys experience.
Subjects: Juvenile fiction, adventure, China, Mongolia, Fiction
Places: Gobi Desert (Mongolia and China), Inner Mongolia (China), Peking
People: Wu Pei-Fu, Christian, Big Tiger, Good Fortune, Sevenstars
Time periods: Post-WWI China, Chinese Warlord Period, 1920's