Inseparable since childhood, Jack and Gin Rathbone inhabit a world of privilege and eccentricity into which no strangers are permitted. Until, that is, Jack falls passionately in love with Vera Savage: a flamboyant and reckless artist over ten years his senior. When they flee to New York City within weeks of meeting, Gin is forced to witness their relationship unfold from a bruised, bereft distance. But when Jack and Vera move to Port Mungo, a seedy town in the mangrove swamps of Honduras, Gin is afforded the opportunity to stake her claim to her brother's life again. This feverish world of tropical impulses and artistic ambition leads, inevitably, to a death swathed immediately in mystery, as the various imperatives of passion, narcissism, and creativity hold them all in relentless thrall.