A powerful generational saga at once tender and suspenseful, overflowing with magic and common sense, this book "resonates with genuine excitement … a big, strong, admirable novel” (New York Times Book Review).

On the island of Willow Springs, off the Georgia coast, the powers of healer Mama Day are tested by her great niece, Cocoa, a stubbornly emancipated woman endangered by the island's darker forces.