• From the Publisher
September 1, 2025

In the ear­ly 1950s, ping pong wasn’t just a pas­time — it was pro­pa­gan­da. A qui­et weapon in the bat­tle for influ­ence, pow­er, and ide­ol­o­gy. Alter­nat­ing between the piv­otal 1971 Ping-Pong Diplo­ma­cy — where a sim­ple game of table ten­nis thawed the icy rela­tions between the U.S. and Chi­na dur­ing the Cold War — and the present-day strug­gles of a fam­i­ly weighed down by lega­cy, Ping is a com­pelling tale of his­to­ry, pol­i­tics, and per­son­al con­flict. Jen­ny, a mod­ern-day teen, wres­tles with her grand­moth­er Miriam’s larg­er-than-life lega­cy, root­ed in Cold War ten­sions and the sur­pris­ing inter­sec­tion of ping pong, anti­semitism, and glob­al diplo­ma­cy. As Jen­ny uncov­ers Miriam’s secret role in shap­ing his­to­ry, she con­fronts her own place in a fam­i­ly bound by gen­er­a­tional expec­ta­tions and unspo­ken truths. Blend­ing fam­i­ly dra­ma with metic­u­lous­ly researched his­tor­i­cal events, this grip­ping sto­ry explores the endur­ing impact of the past on the present.

Discussion Questions