Ivory Frame, now in her nineties, is the famously reclusive painter. She has never married, never had a family, never had a child. So when a letter arrives disclosing that she has a granddaughter living in New York, her world is turned upside down and the past is brought painfully to life. Masterfully written, and emotionally charged, this novel is about love and grief and art and the realization that, like tragedy, the best things in life arrive out of the blue.