Imprisoned in the Golden City: Adoniram and Ann Judson by Dave and Neta Jackson

Stand alone novel

Summary: 

The two young Burmeze girls had dreaded leaving their father but he told them that the only sfe thing was for the two of them to go live with the American missionaries, Adoniram and Ann Judson. May-Lo and Len-Lay really aren’t sure what the danger is, and they don’t know what to believe about their American foster parents. Could the accusations that the missionaries were English spies be true?

When the Judsons leave the city of Rangoon to establish a mission work in Ava, the Golden City, the girls are taken along on the dangerous river trip that will separate them from their father by 350 miles. Will they ever see him again? Will they even make it to their destination? How will the emperor of Burma respond to Mr. Judson’s petitions to give religious freedom to Christian converts?

Their arrival is followed by eventual disaster. When the British attack the Burmese, all the white foreigners, including Adoniram Judson, are hauled off to the terrible Death Prison. Every clue indicates that the Judsons are spies, and a Burmese-English boy named Myat Rodgers is determined to prove their guilt. Should the girls tell the authorities what they know? Or will they all end up in the Death Prison?

Without their father’s help, whom could they trust?

Opening Lines: 

Squatting on the open porch of the little bamboo house on the outskirts of the city of Rangoon, Len-Lay didn't see the shadowy figure crouching in the dark below. The house, like many in the country of Burma in 1823, stood off the ground on four-foot-high stilts. Pigs grunted contentedly underneath; scrawny chickens had ceased their endless pecking as night fell and were roosting among the stilts.