This is a book focusing on one man’s life. That will at first sight seem a very small topic within the wide span of history, especially in the context of the great nation of China. The author David, Jowett’s youngest son, brought up in China and Chinese-speaking, explained its genesis in a letter to a close friend. ‘I inherited from my siblings the plan for an appreciation of my father’s life, with two initial sections about his family’s background and his own early years. Having explored archive sources, I shifted the focus from Jowett and his family to Jowett as a China missionary and the context in which he was living and working’ That was how the author summarised in two short sentences the genesis, aim, generation, and focus of his account.