Poppy is on an odyssey. Her adoptive mother has taken off to find herself, so Poppy decides to live with her adoptive father, his new wife, Calypso, and their toddler, Sandeep, in a ramshackle rasp-berry-colored house. At first Poppy is distressed by the disordered household, which is unlike anything she has ever known, but soon it becomes a jumping-off point for her search for her birth mother.

Poppy discovers a great many things in the course of her search. She finds a kindred spirit in a strange, sickly woman named Becca, and an unexpected connection with the hippy, Calypso. But most of all, she finds a part of herself she didn’t even know was missing.