"The Flattery sisters, four brilliant and very different girls raised in a small town south of Dublin, were plunged prematurely into adulthood when their parents died in a tragic accident. Now, in their thirties--each unmarried, each holding a PhD--they are striving to make an impact on an increasingly volatile world. The four lead disparate, distanced lives, from classrooms in Connecticut to fancy catering gigs in London's Notting Hill, until one day their oldest sister, a geologist haunted by a terrible awareness of the earth's future, abruptly vanishes from her home. Together for the first time in years, the Flatterys descend on the Irish countryside in search of a sister who doesn't actually want to be found. Sheltered in a derelict rural bungalow, coaxed along by the colorful denizens of a local pub, they reach into their common past, confronting both old wounds and a desperately uncertain future."--