International Latino Book Award Gold Medal Winner
Winner of the Friends of American Writers Literature Award

For fans of Rebecca Serle and Elizabeth Acevedo, a “lyrical, poignant, and powerful” (Yamile Saied Méndez, award-winning author of All Roads Lead to Rome) work of magical realism about a woman’s journey to Colombia to discover her roots and what it means to carry our ancestors with us.

Dolores Moore’s dead relatives refuse to stay quiet. They trail after her like a Greek chorus with no respect for personal boundaries, filling her crumbling Victorian with unsolicited advice, family gossip, and increasingly urgent opinions about her return to Colombia—the birthplace she barely remembers.

Dorrie would rather stay in Minneapolis, where the problems are manageable: an ex she hasn’t forgotten, a cartography career that’s evaporated overnight, a creaky inherited house, and two needy orange cats. But when a cryptic hand-drawn map surfaces and an old flame offers to watch the house, the voices leave her no choice.

So begins a journey to Colombia guided by photographs of her mother, half-remembered stories about her father, and a little bit of magic as Dorrie searches for the truth about her family origins, her ancestral roots, and what’s been calling her to her rightful place.