The Absence of Nectar
Alice is a precocious eleven-year-old growing up in rural East Texas with one wish on her mind: get rid of Simon Jester. Simon is the man who saved her mother from drowning. ... Alice and her saintly brother become convinced that Simon intends to poison them. Their mother, Megs getlls her children that they have wild imaginations. Until she come to kiss them one night and, instead of her usual endearments, whispers a single word: Run ... taken from cover.