West Virginia is hidden, and nothing is more hidden than the lives of its women. Four different women in this novel: : a daughter abandoned by her mother. : the mother who tries to explain. : the young daughter, who, in a desperate effort to alleviate her mother's pain, falls flat when confronted by an unexpected reality. : the furious source, who, though dead, lives and moves within each relationship, the strength of her memory spanning generations. A of Appalachian life beginning in the early 1900's unto the present day. is a must read for fans of Appalachian fiction and the women who struggle within the confines of a culture which not only resists change, but resists them.