"It's 1922 at Far Cry Cannery, a quarter mile of boardwalk and wooden buildings strung along the rocks of Rivers Inlet on the northwest coast of British Columbia. The time has come for Anders Viken, storekeeper and honorary uncle to the recently orphaned Kit, to give an account of his secret self: the reason why he fled the loving grip of his family in Norway, his years of rough living, and his impossible love--the kind in which pain and longing are braided together. As the sockeye flood up the inlet, Anders spends long nights recording his confessions for eighteen-year-old Kit, the only remaining member of his chosen family after Kit's mother, Bobbie, scandalized the cannery town by running off the handsome Chinese camp cook, and her father, Frank, was found drowned beside his own boat in the harbour. While her uncle does his reckoning, Kit fends off the advances of the cannery manager and tries to earn her keep. Oars in hand, she glides her skiff out over the great returning school and casts her net. This, at least, makes sense to her, as opposed to the convoluted workings of love." - Cover.