Echoing among the Blue Ridge Mountains were the cries of newborn babies that disappeared into the night. The screams of children nearly drowned out by the sound of crickets. A girl, hidden and waiting to be found, terrified, and confused. The fireflies sparkling in the woods, bringing light to darkled places.

The bulk of Jesse’s memories were of growing up in the farm country of the Blue Ridge Mountains in North Carolina. The farm folks stayed pretty much outside of town, except for visits to the feed store causing random tractors to travel down Main Street. A large family struggles to survive the chaotic nature of the family head: their mother, a blend of rage, disappointment, and religious command. Her husband follows sheepishly behind, a monster of his own kind. There were beatings and abuses, manipulation and terror carried out in spaces breathtaking in their beauty.

And then there’s young Jesse: unwanted from conception but kept as a pawn for her mother’s bidding. Her life is a tale of growing up with no one to count on but herself.

A story of southern hills, a mother’s neglect, fireflies, kidnapping, birth, death, and the taste of sweet mulberries ripened by the sun. Jesse is a girl, hidden, who becomes a woman, discovered.