A vengeful spirit wills itself into existence in a land where people are property and dreams of freedom incite rebellion against those who profit from slave labor in this magical realism story rooted in West African mythology.

1794, Benin, Africa. Bako is one of 162 men stolen from their homeland. After a harrowing voyage across the sea, penned like livestock, and enduring brutal beatings, Bako survived when many of his fellow countrymen did not. On the Caribbean island of Dominica, he is sold to William Blackwell, sentenced to a life of forced servitude on a sugarcane plantation. Rechristened Ivan, his true identity and defiant nature cannot be tamed. When an indigenous Kalinago woman named Mary is threatened by Blackwell’s cruel son, Bako fights back, escaping with her into the mountains—where she will give birth to their daughter.

Etta is an ogbanje, an unborn soul, trapped in a cycle of conception and death in the wombs of one family. She is not of this Earth, existing among the stars, bearing the names of Queen Mother and Iyoba. A gifted siren, her voice unleashes ethereal songs that consume listeners with fear. Her desperate desire to live compelled Bako into the hands of his captors—and his fateful meeting with Mary. They are but vessels brought together to ensure Etta’s birth into the mortal world.

But Etta bears the physical scars of her many spiritual deaths. The Kalinago do not accept her into their clan. Her father suspects the truth of his daughter’s origins. And the landowners and tradesmen who enslave Etta’s people will feel her wrath as she compels rebellions, the one within, the gravest.