Ten-year-old Samantha's 1983 trip to the Soviet Union, following her much publicized letter to Andropov, is described in a first person narrative, accompanied by numerous photographs in color and black and white. Although readers see her under tremendous pressure as an overnight celebrity, she never loses sight of her original goal: to find out what the Soviet people are really like. She discovers that they are not as different from Americans as she had been led to believe and that the Russians she meets are just as anxious for peace and friendship as she is herself. (Ages 7-13)