Spotting a lost child who flees into the woods, Tess, a woman whose high-profile marriage was shattered by her inability to have children is disbelieved by local authorities and conducts an obsessive search that becomes tied to her efforts to heal.

"Sylvie can hardly bear to remember how normal her family was two years ago. All of that changed on the night an oncoming vehicle forced their car over the edge of a covered bridge into the river. With horrible swiftness, Sylvie's young son was gone, her husband lost his legs, and she was left with shattering blame and grief. Eleven-year-old Ruby misses her little brother, too. But she also misses the mother who has become a recluse in their old home...

"It's been five years since the Mason family vacationed at the lakeside cottage in northeastern Vermont, close to where prize-winning novelist Samuel Mason grew up. The summers that Sam, his wife, Mena, and their twins Franny and Finn spent at Lake Gormlaith were noisy, chaotic, and nearly perfect. But since Franny's death, the Masons have been flailing, one step away from falling apart. Lake Gormlaith is Sam's last, best hope of rescuing his son...