by Lara Valenor
A Dublin illustrator. A boyfriend who won't wake. An ancient rite that could bring him back — and a stranger she was never meant to love. Some returns come at a price. When her boyfriend slips into a coma no one believes he'll wake from, Áine McCrea leaves Dublin for the quiet of Castlebaldwin — the place where her childhood is buried, and where something begins to call her. A symbol carved in stone. A medallion that shouldn't feel familiar. Dreams that repeat like a warning. Following signs she can't explain, Áine crosses the ocean to Sandwich, Massachusetts, as an au pair for the Lynch family — where the pull only grows stronger, and where she meets Kilyan. What they begin to uncover is old, fragmentary, and dangerous — a knowledge the world was never meant to hold, and a threshold that should never be crossed. There may be a way to bring Sean back. There is always a price. And the closer Áine grows to Kilyan, the clearer it becomes: waking the man she's losing may cost her the man she's only just found.
