Minli and her family live in a small hut in a poor, rainless village at the bottom of a mountain. Legend has it that Fruitless Mountain will only grow green again once Jade Dragon reunites with her long-lost children. Minli feels that, if only Fruitless Mountain would grow green, her family and community would prosper. The family’s meagre prospects set up the theme of the value of gratitude.
When her father, Ba, tells Minli a story about the all-knowing Old Man of the Moon, Minli determines that the Old Man can solve their problems. Minli’s mother, Ma, believes stories to be foolish fantasy, but Minli is willing to risk believing in the impossible. This sets up a sub-conflict in the novel—Ma vs. Minli. When Minli leaves home without her parents' permission, thus begins her hero’s journey, which closely follows the structure of a classic hero's journey. Screenwriter Christopher Vogel's 12-stage model of the hero's journey, inspired by Joseph Campbell’s model, is useful in tracking Minli’s character arc and themes in Where the Mountain Meets the Moon, even though the author condenses, skips, or rearranges some steps.
Minli’s journey begins when she purchases a goldfish for good luck from the goldfish man. Ma accuses Minli of wasting her money. Feeling guilty, Minli releases the goldfish into the Jade River, which happens to be the goldfish’s original destination. To thank Minli, the goldfish offers to show her the way to Never-Ending Mountain to meet the Man of the Moon. Minli leaves a note for her parents, and using the fish’s instructions, she fashions a compass. Ma and Ba begin to follow Minli, but the goldfish man convinces them to trust Minli and await her return at home.
Minli saves a flightless dragon, and he journeys with her to ask the Man of the Moon why he can’t fly. They travel toward The City of Bright Moonlight, where Minli asks the king for the “borrowed line” she’ll need for her journey. The king offers Minli a page from the Book of Fortune with a single line “You only lose what you cling to” (140). Meanwhile, the stone lions at the gates of the city offer Dragon a red string.
Again on their way to the Never-Ending Mountain, Dragon and Minli encounter a town where seeds rain from the sky, planting gold-flowered trees. They have an altercation with Green Tiger, a reincarnation of the greedy Magistrate Tiger (who appears as the antagonist in several of the novel’s stories). The tiger wounds Dragon, and twins from the village, A-Fu and Da-Fu, trick the tiger into killing himself.
A-Fu and Da-Fu explain how the villagers released kites into the sky, inadvertently sending their wishes to the Man of the Moon. Minli fashions a kite from her page and Dragon’s red string, then she travels alone up the Never-Ending Mountain. The Man of the Moon will only answer one question and, forgoing her desire to help her family, Minli asks how she can help Dragon fly. Upon returning to Dragon, she removes a stone from his head, and he’s able to fly her back to Ma and Ba. There, the stone turns into a dragon’s pearl, which Minli gives to the king. In return, he gifts them seeds for their village. Dragon reunites with his mother, Jade Dragon, and Minli’s village is prosperous again. In the end, Minli succeeds in two ways: she learns to be grateful for what she already had and, as a reward for her good character, is also able to bring prosperity to her village.
