Shashi has grown up with just her father and some strange stories about a mother who disappeared when she was a baby. But when she begins to hear voices calling her from the sea, she confronts her father about who her mother was and gets a disconcerting answer--one that will sweep her up in the epic, age-old battle between Land and Sea, and one that will force her to find allies in other freakyweird inbetweeners like herself.