After many years in Boston, Lil and Frank have retired to North Carolina. The two of them married young, having bonded over how they both lost a parent when they were children. Now, Lil has become determined to leave a history for their own kids.

She sifts through letters and notes and diary entries, uncovering old stories --- and perhaps revealing more secrets than Frank wants their children to know. Meanwhile, Frank has become obsessed with the house he lived in as a boy on the outskirts of town, where a young single mother, Shelley, is now raising her son. For Shelley, Frank’s repeated visits begin to trigger vivid memories of her own family.

Empathetic and profound, this novel from master storyteller Jill McCorkle deconstructs and reconstructs what it means to be a father or a mother, and to be a child trying to know your parents --- a child learning to make sense of the hieroglyphics of history and memory.

Audiobook available, read by Xe Sands