They say you can't go home again, but sometimes you have to.
Evie Ferrante, recently promoted curator for a New York City historical society, is about to launch her first exhibit, "Seared in Memory," which commemorates several of New York's historic fires and includes, to Evie's great pride, the engine from the B-25 bomber that struck the 79th floor of the Empire State Building on a fog-shrouded morning in 1945. But Evie's triumph is cut short by a phone call: Her mother has been rushed to the hospital. Again. Now Evie must return to the house in which she grew up, in a quirky waterfront neighborhood in the Bronx.
As she begins to sort through the mess her mother has left behind, Evie becomes increasingly close to her mother's elderly neighbor, Mina Yetner. Mina is still sharp -- or at least she has been, though she confesses to Evie that she's been the victim of a string of "accidents" that she can neither explain nor keep track of. And though Mina's not afraid of dying, she is afraid of losing her memory - or her mind.
Before too long, Evie finds herself "curating" Mina - piecing together her past and present, using Mina's stories and the objects in her house - and, in so doing, begins to think there's a larger story at work . . . one that could have deadly consequences for both women.
