Earning money to help his family in 1906, ten-year-old newsboy Leo explores the hilly city's bustling business world and modern innovations before a massive earthquake and decimating fire change everything he has ever known.

"On the eve of the San Fransisco Earthquake of 1906, Mercy Wong--daughter of Chinese immigrants--is struggling to hold her own among the spoiled heiresses at prestigious St. Clare's School. When tragedy strikes, everyone must band together to survive"--

Just turned twelve, Lily is the oldest of the three children in her Chinese American family living in San Francisco when the 1906 earthquake hits; her family has survived the quake, but as the city starts to burn Lily and her younger brother are separated from the others and must get to the safety of Oakland across the bay and hope that the rest of their family and friends are there waiting for them--but between the fire and the anti-Chinese violence...

"Matthew J. Davenport's The Longest Minute is the spellbinding true story of the 1906 earthquake and fire in San Francisco, and how a great earthquake sparked a devastating and preventable firestorm. At 5:12 a.m. on April 18, 1906, a 7.9 magnitude earthquake struck San Francisco, catching most of the city asleep. For approximately one minute, shockwaves buckled streets, shattered water mains, collapsed buildings, crushed hundreds of residents to death...

An exploration of earthquakes places a particular focus on the San Francisco disaster of 1906, describing how it affected more than two hundred miles of California, triggered a vast firestorm, and destroyed the gold-rush capital.