Ted and Maisie's parents moved to the community of Blackberry Mountain in upstate New York, full of hope for the future; they would live a wholesome life rooted in the natural world, free from social constraints and the ugly urban climate of the early seventies. But all this changes when Maisie, age fifteen, stands poised at the top of a waterfall on the Fourth of July, looking down over the family, friends, and neighbors for whom she is an emblem - young, free-spirited, and irreverent - before plunging headfirst into the shallow pool, doing herself injuries that will mark them all forever. This purposeful and defiant act is the mystery her younger brother will devote his life to solving. And as Ted investigates his relationship with his sister and parents and community, he gradually uncovers difficult truths long unsuspected or willfully unacknowledged.