On the voy­age home to the Azores Islands, Eva accepts the pagan name of Arethusa but learns too late that her life will mir­ror the Greek nymph's tragic end. Her mother reveals that her des­tiny lies with Diogo, the shipowner's volatile son. But Eva has a vision of another . . .

When the ship founders in a storm off the coast, Tristan, a local boy, saves her life and steals her heart. Destined to be with Diogo yet aching for Tristan's for­bid­den love, Eva must some­how choose between them, or fate will choose for her.

This is an engross­ing novel in which sev­eral strands of myth com­bine to cre­ate a com­plex yet beau­ti­fully sim­ple romance. It is at its high­est level an explo­ration of fun­da­men­tal philo­soph­i­cal questions--the debate between fate and choice, the nature of love and desire, the tena­cious and often dan­ger­ous hold of belief on the human psy­che. At bot­tom, and the rea­son why you will love it, this is a bil­dungsro­man about a girl find­ing her way to adult­hood and a story about two lovers both sep­a­rated and entwined by their beliefs.