In Mississippi in the early 1900s ten-year-old David Logan's family generously shares their well water with both white and black neighbors in an atmosphere of potential racial violence.

A cumulative rhyme relating how Ki-pat brought rain to the drought-stricken Kapiti Plain--Title page verso

As they prepare to make the traditional, pillowy bread called sopaipilla, Christina's grandmother tells about the time her great-grandfather, aided by a scarecrow, brought an end to a drought and, in the process, helped make the first sopaipilla.

When a drought tests the commitment of a mail-order bride from Maine to her new home on the prairie, her stepchildren hope they will be able to remain a family.

When Hazel Sharp, daughter of Mirror Lake's longtime local detective, unexpectedly inherits her childhood home, she's warily drawn back to the town--and people--she left behind almost a decade earlier. But Hazel's not the only relic of the past to return: a drought has descended on the region, and as the water level in the lake drops, long-hidden secrets begin to emerge ... including evidence that may help finally explain the mystery of her mother's...