"Linnet waited with her eyes closed for the door to open and her mother to peek in. Waited for her to touch Linnet's shoulder blades lightly...Linnet knew that touch in her bones, as if it had happened every night of her life. An imprint, a memory of the skin itself."

So begins this startling first novel about an eleven-year-old girl who suddenly begins to grow wings -- wings with soft auburn feathers, which only at first can be hidden with long hair and loose clothes. Funny, sad, and hopeful, this remarkable story captures a girl's shock at feeling alone in life, as it follows her journey to answer a most important question: how can a girl with wings ever fit into the world?