Hobson, Brandon

Ziggy's mother disappeared ten years ago, one of the many Native women who have mysteriously gone missing, and Ziggy believes a secret cave may hold the key--so with his sister, Moon, and friends Alice and Corso, he sets out to find the cave and solve the mystery of his family's origins.

With his single mother in jail, Sequoyah, a fifteen-year-old Cherokee boy, is placed in foster care with the Troutt family. Literally and figuratively scarred by his unstable upbringing, Sequoyah has spent years mostly keeping to himself, living with his emotions pressed deep below the surface; that is, until he meets the seventeen-year-old Rosemary, another youth staying with the Troutts. Sequoyah and Rosemary bond over their shared Native American backgrounds and tumultuous paths through the foster care system, but as Sequoyah's feelings toward Rosemary deepen, the precariousness of their lives and the scars of their pasts threaten to undo them both.

In 1980s rural Oklahoma, a fifteen-year-old Cherokee boy named Sequoyah comes of age in the foster care system while his single mother is in jail. He lives with the Troutt family and is literally scarred by his mother's substance abuse. When he meets seventeen-year-old Rosemary, a troubled artist who also lives with the family, the two bond over their shared Native American background and foster care experiences. Their feelings for each other grow, but the pain of their pasts and their present situation threaten their happiness.