Gemma is sixteen, and has been raised in India her whole life... so she pines for the sophistication of Victorian London. She finds herself packed away to a British finishing school under tragic--- and bewildering--- circumstances. Neither rich nor beautiful, and an outcast, Gemma continues to pine for what she cannot have, and tries to figure out her other-worldly visions. If you like Victorian boarding school settings, Gothic horror, secret societies, and magic and visions in your fiction, you should enjoy this book.

The most intriguing part of the book involved Gemma and her friends: the weak and insecure Ann; the beautiful and jealous Pippa; the power-hungry and controlling Felicity. While bound together in a sort of friendship by the secrets they shared, the relationships are never what one would exactly call healthy. It was a little odd to find the girls constantly betraying one another without repercussion or consequence. Though the characterization was a little frustrating at times, the book as a whole was very enjoyable, and I look forward to seeing if the characters transcend their flaws in the two subsequent books.

Most biographies that we read revolve around people who do exciting things--- they become great leaders, they create something special, they discover something important. In Barakat's book, she rather focuses on a few years of her childhood, when the Six-Day War uprooted her family from all that was safe and familiar, and turned them into refugees.

Whether or not you understand the history and politics behind the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, you will undoubtedly be touched by the life of this little girl, ordinary at some times, but heartbreaking at others. But her spirit helps her triumph over obstacles that might have crushed others... it's difficult to remember that she was only about six by the time the book ends.