Rosemary Langford, an English girl living in Singapore,dreams of going to a finishing school in Switzerland, but the war intervenes, so she has to be 'finished 'in Singapore. She is taught Cantonese by a Chines girl, Mei Ling, with whom she becomes close friends. When the war finally reaches Singapore, she and her mother work in a hospital, and when the island falls to the Japanese, they are sent to an internment camp, where they suffer terrible privations. Rosemary's experiences in the camp are quite harrowing, but there are touches of humour that lighten even the grimmest parts of the story. One of the best characters in the book is Mrs Dredge, a whining hypochondriac who is totally dependent on her husband, but becomes in the camp a tower of strength. The book is told mainly from Rosemary's point of view, but also partly from the viewpoint of her friend Mei Ling. Rosemary's determination to survive helps her endure the horrors of the camp, and afterwards, when she is discussing it with her friends, one of them asks if she ever got to her finishing school she replies drily "no, I never got there, but I didn't need to. The camp was my finishing school. It nearly finished me off!"