Girl in the White Cape (eBook)

Fifteen-year-old Elena lives in a church attic in San Francisco's Richmond neighborhood, where she is cared for by her guardian, a kind Russian priest named Father Al. Six days a week, Father Al sends her out of Our Lady, across the meadows and ponds of Golden Gate Park, and all the way to Baba Vera's house on Taraval Street for Baba's version of school.Unlike regular school, however, Elena's learning is unnerving. Baba Vera's preposterous demands, dizzying antics, and housewhich is full of skeletons, brooms, strange implements, and guinea pigs, among other odditiesseem straight out of a Russian fairy tale Father Al used to read to Elena . . . not life in 2020. If not for her beloved doll, Kuklabequeathed to her by the mother she never got to know, but of whom she often dreamsElena would be overwhelmed. Yet she works hard at every task given her, understanding intuitively that there is a purpose to every one of her grandmother's strange assignments.Frank, a young taxi driver, enters Elena's world on the day he delivers a strange, witch-like woman named Anya to Our Lady. Upon meeting Anya and Elena, a dream-world begins to spin for himand he feels a deep, protective pull toward Elena. In the days that follow, Frank devotes himself to saving her from the harm he is sure Anya intends toward her. What he comes to understand, as he enters more deeply into Elena's story, is that she has magic of her own. He thought he was supposed to save herbut in the end, the two of them may just save each other.