A Nebraska tornado swept away their mother when Leni was nine and her sister Amelia was twelve. Though bound together by tragedy, the sisters grow apart-Leni wrapping herself in silence and solitude while Amelia craves the chaos of a large, close-knit family. Following their different paths, Leni becomes a librarian and Amelia marries into the large family she always wanted. Concerned with her sister's narrow small-town life, Amelia insists that Leni join her husband's family at their New Hampshire lake house for a massive Fourth of July reunion. Over the long weekend, a stifling heat wave settles over the house and simmering resentments-between the sisters, between husbands and wives, between mothers and daughters-boil over, on the beach and in the kitchen and behind closed doors. As a tornado-like storm rolls in over the lake, devastating secrets are revealed, leaving no one unscathed.

A richly atmospheric novel of literary women's fiction, this emotionally gripping family drama explores sisterhood, grief, marriage, motherhood, and the secrets that can bind a family together-or break it apart.