A young Yemeni Israeli woman learns of her mother’s secret romance in a dra­mat­ic jour­ney through lost fam­i­ly sto­ries, reveal­ing the unbreak­able bond between a moth­er and a daugh­ter — the debut nov­el of an award-win­ning lit­er­ary voice.

1950. Thou­sands of Yemeni Jews have immi­grat­ed to the new­ly found­ed Israel in search of a bet­ter life. In an over­crowd­ed immi­grant camp in Rosh Ha’ayin, Yaqub, a shy young man, hap­pens upon Sai­da, a beau­ti­ful girl singing by the riv­er. In the midst of chaos and uncer­tain­ty, they fall in love. But they weren’t sup­posed to; Sai­da is mar­ried and has a child, and a mar­ried woman has no place befriend­ing anoth­er man.

1995. Thir­ty-some­thing Zohara, Saida’s daugh­ter, has been liv­ing in New York City — a city that feels much less com­pli­cat­ed than Israel, where she grew up wish­ing that her skin was lighter, that her illit­er­ate mother’s Yemeni music was qui­eter, and that the father who always favored her was alive. She hasn’t looked back since leav­ing home, rarely in touch with her moth­er or sis­ter, Lizzie, and miss­ing out on her nephew Yoni’s child­hood. But when Lizzie calls to tell her their moth­er has died, she gets on a plane to Israel with no return tick­et.

Soon Zohara finds her­self on an unex­pect­ed path that leads to shock­ing truths about her fam­i­ly — includ­ing dan­gers that lurk for impres­sion­able young men and secrets that force her to ques­tion every­thing she thought she knew about her par­ents, her her­itage, and her own future.