Martha is 12--and very different from other kids, because of her parents. Strict members of a religious group--the Brethren--their rules dominate Martha's life. And one rule is the most important of all: she must never ever invite anyone home. If she does, their shameful secret--Abomination--could be revealed. But as Martha makes her first real friend in Scott, a new boy at school, she begins to wonder. Is she doing the right thing by helping to keep Abomination a secret? And just how far will her parents go to prevent the truth from being known?

Charlotte is out in the woods on her own one day when something mysterious happens - she walks along a row of stones laid like stepping stones on the forest floor . She has somehow slipped back to 1955, and is now, in the same woods, on the site of a very unique school, an open-air school for sick city children.