"Kit Pitman is fourteen and lives in a ramshackle cottage on the outer banks of Newfoundland, where isolation is all she knows. The only visitors are fogbound fishermen and the occasional young man brought ashore to keep the bloodlines clean. But Kit's isolation is compounded by the mystery that surrounds her family and her illegitimate birth. Her mother, Josie, is mentally challenged and often runs wild among the clapboard houses that dot the shore.

Meanwhile, her grandmother Lizzy staunchly guards them both from the disapproving glances that pious townsfolk cast their way. But when Lizzy dies suddenly, Kit and her childlike mother are left vulnerable to life's harsh realities and unexpected dangers that threaten to break them in two."--BOOK JACKET.