In a small South Carolina town, where it seems little has changed since the Civil War, sixteen-year-old Ethan is powerfully drawn to Lena, a new classmate with whom he shares a psychic connection and whose family hides a dark secret that may be revealed on her sixteenth birthday.

Eighteen-year-old Birdie Lindberg coped with her isolated upbringing and grandmother's strict home-schooling by nurturing a fantastical imagination where she is a heroic detective. She takes a job the summer before college at a historic Seattle hotel where she is pressed into working with the hotel's van driver, nineteen-year-old Daniel Aoki. Knowing Birdie loves mystery books, Daniel suggests they investigate a mysterious, long-time resident of the...