With her unmatched gift for illuminating the joysand challenges of love and family, New Fork Timesbestselling author Luanne Rice now takes readers onan emotional journey into the tender, unmappedterritory that lies between mothers and daughters,and fathers and sons. Here is a mesmerizing newnovel that reaches back into the past to find the keyto a boundless future.

Neve Halloran and her daughter have shared afierce love for the austere beauty of Rhode Island'sSouth County ever since Neve guided Mickey'sfirst baby steps along the sandy shore. Now, withMickey a teenager and Neve's last hope forhappiness with her daughter's loving but unstablefather gone, both will struggle to make a new lifetogether amid the windswept landscape thatsustains them.

Captivated by a fragile wildlife sanctuary, Mickeywill move toward womanhood in the company ofa lonely boy who shares her instinctive way withthe creatures of the coast. And Neve will findherself drawn to a man who has devoted his life tothe sanctuary, but who is unable to share the painof a recent loss--or reconnect with the father whostill bears the scars of World War Ⅱ.

As winter gives way to spring, and spring tosummer, a secret will emerge that has lain buried inthe depths just offshore for decades, a secret thatwill galvanize the small seaside community. Forthe waters bear their own vestige of the past--andtheir ceaseless rhythms may point the way to hopeand new beginnings.