With the meteoric rise of China over the past decades comes an increase in the number of people who are drawn to the Middle Kingdom for travel and business, along with a corresponding surge in guidebooks on Chinese culture and business etiquette. But such books only brush the surface.

Author Gary Moreau discovered the hard way that being an effective businessperson in China takes more than just learning what to expect and how to react in different situations. He realized he had to understand not just how our cultures differ but "why" they differ.

In "Understanding China," Moreau...

After a long career filled with triumphant successes and devastating failures, American businessman Adam Bertrand is well accustomed to the ups and downs of life. Still, several years after starting a new life in the thriving, modern city of Beijing, China, nothing could have prepared him for the disaster that awaits him.

Now, his wife and daughters are gone-his health, ravaged by a growing alcohol addiction. With no job and no sense of purpose, Adam flounders in a sea of loneliness and despair, desperate to fix the pieces of his broken existence. But through the unexpected power of...