Barbara O'Connor

Twelve-year-old Pearl feels hurt, confused, and unwanted when her wild, irresponsible mother leaves her with Aunt Ivy in a little country house in Georgia and then disappears.

When dissension erupts in the town of Foley, South Carolina, after a baby is left on the steps of the Rock of Ages Baptist Church, eleven-year-old Randall must decide whether or not to keep secret his knowledge of who the foundling's mother is.