Publisher's Synopsis
This is a complex but "gentle" story about an old woman of great force named Maria, whose death occurs at its very beginning. The development of her character and her influence upon the intertwining lives of the people in her rural community, many of whom are her relatives as well as relatives of each other, form the central narrative of the novel. But there is a secret in Maria's life, something that happened in 1924, during which year there are no entries in her journal and after which her writing seemed changed in a strange way. As her nephew searches deeper into her story, he discovers that most of the other characters have secrets, anxieties, conflicts, and unanswered questions of their own, people whom Maria understood and whom she sometimes was able to help in the resolution of their problems.
