Ember Ozette is brought to life from a tiny embryo when a forensic scientist discovers a pregnant Neanderthal preserved for centuries in arctic ice. Keeping his research secret, and driven by motives much deeper than he can lay claim to, Dr. Yute Nahadeh implants the embryo in a surrogate mother, and a Neanderthal infant is born. Raised among the Quanoot Indians of Whaler Bay, Washington, Ember is a child of the present, as modern as those around her. She takes pleasure in her family, excels in sports, hikes in the woods that surround her home. Even so, her otherness is a source of great shame. What is the purpose of her extraordinary gifts - her power to heal, her uncanny perceptions, the vivid dreams that disturb her sleep? Her quest for answers is driven by visions of a band of mysterious golden-skinned people - the last survivors of their race - who are fleeing genocide. Somehow, their rescue depends on her. But who are they, and why do they call to her, and where can they be found? In a climax as moving and suspenseful as any in recent fiction, Ember is compelled to search for her ancestors. She doesn't fully understand the need to find them; only that it is as central to her as her beating heart. Her search is urgent, and dangerous, and as she struggles to unravel the mystery of her past, the scientist returns with his own claims on her destiny. But like all journeys undertaken with passion, this one takes Ember both far from home and deep into her own heart, to a fuller knowledge about the past, about herself, and about the meaning of dreams she has struggled all her life to understand.