"When Willie Lee Woolston, a thirty-three-year-old burned-out blues singer with flame-red hair, moves to the dusty mining town of Los Fuegos, New Mexico, she thinks she is hiding from the ghosts of her past. She buys an abandoned adobe along the town's dry arroyo and settles down among the old Hispanic families that have lived there for generations.".

"Right from the start she is drawn into the tumultuous lives and dreams of the townspeople - a pair of not-quite-teenaged lovers struggling to find a place for themselves, a family living in an abandoned boxcar, an appliance repairman who plays the accordion to summon his lost brother, and most of all, Chavela, a woman who makes her realize that sometimes love chooses us.

Then, just as Willie Lee finds her singing voice again, an accident at the copper mine threatens the town with disaster, forcing people together - and apart - in unexpected ways."--BOOK JACKET.