As Rosamond Smith, Joyce Carol Oates has explored the secret kinship of twins, often depicted as diabolical doubles who are mirror images of our darker, more violent selves - haunting reflections of our deepest fears and dreads.

Starr Bright is the tormented, murderous side of Sharon Donner, a model and exotic dancer turned avenging angel. A drifter who has staked out the Nevada desert as her own personal hell, she lives in a desolate landscape of endless highways and seedy motel rooms. Night after night, she searches for God and love in the fleeting, brutish attentions of men. She travels light: a wallet, some cosmetics, amphetamines, and one pearl-handled stainless steel carving knife with a five-inch blade.

Her calling card is a satanic star traced with each of her victims' blood, proof that she is keeping her promise that "Starr Bright will be with you soon." Now, on the eve of her thirty-seventh birthday, Starr/Sharon returns home to reclaim the part of herself she left behind. She arrives in Yewville, a quiet New York suburb where her twin sister, Lily, lives with her husband and teenage daughter.

Here, thousands of miles away from the scenes of her horrific crimes, she insinuates herself into Lily's community, Lily's family, Lily's life.