 The name of the novel derives from the "Glass Palace Chronicle", which is an old Burmese historical work commissioned by King Bagyidaw in 1829.The novel starts with an 11-year-old boy called Rajkumar running through the city of Mandalay to find a woman called Ma Cho.He is the last surviving member of his family and comes to Burma from India with a bright entrepreneurial spirit and a hunger for success.