This well-written piece of historical fiction covers a little known, awful piece of Maine history. Turner Buckminster is a preacher's son who arrives in the small town of Phippsburg with his parents. From the start, things go bad for Turner and he hates his new home until he makes friends with Lizzie, a lively young black girl who lives on a nearby Malaga island with other African-Americans who were escaped or freed slaves. The townspeople want to clear the island of it's shacks and the black residents to make the area more attractive to tourists. They end up taking part of the residents, including Lizzie, to the Home for the Feeble-Minded. When Turner finally has the opportunity to bring Lizzie home, he discovers she had died at the Home. Schmidt has takent the appalling racism of the townspeople and Turner's helplessness in the face of their treachery and created a poignant and memorable story.
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