Escaping a life riddled with tragedy, Irene finds herself alone in an intoxicatingly tropical corner of Central America. At La Llorona, a neglected lakeside hotel beside the village's storied volcano, she builds a new life for herself, one woven together with Scheherazade-like fables of Indigenous life. This heartrending, epic novel is about the histories that come back to haunt us, the indifference of fate, and the magical powers of the natural world. (RR)