Twelve-year-old Jade Rivera and her best friend KK stumble upon a band of zany suburbanites in the desert of Arizona. The gang has just kidnapped the President of the United States, and now they have the girls, too! The suburbanites are demanding a ransom: they want the Superstition Mountain wilderness area to be developed into a suburban paradise. Drawing on knowledge of the desert environment and from her Mexican and Chinese heritages, Jade forms a plan with KK's help. Will Jade get them out of this mess and save the president, too? A humorous adventure with a serious undercurrent that focuses on cultural diversity, Native American history, wilderness survival and environmental protection.