Convinced that if she looks like a monster on the outside (a blood tumor covers half of her face), she must be a monster on the inside as well, Sophie tries to find a cure before her mother finds out the truth.--

The author describes how he uprooted his family to the English countryside and purchased a dilapidated zoo, which he planned to refurbish and reopen as a family business, a scheme complicated by a lack of money and his wife's devastating illness.

Sixty-eight-year-old David has a brain tumor that he attributes to Agent Orange exposure. He wakes up from surgery repeating the name of a Native American soldier whom he was once ordered to discipline, and decides to return something precious he long ago stole from that man.