How did Lucy Greythorne die? From the moment Nell Featherstone arrives at Greythorne Manor as a governess to eight-year-old Sophie, she finds herself haunted by the fate of the mistress of the house, and entranced by the child's father, the enigmatic Professor Nathaniel Greythorne. When a violent storm reveals Lucy's body is not in her grave, Nell becomes suspicious about the Professor's research. But what she discovers in his laboratory will turn all her ideas about life and death, morality and creation on their head. Enthralled by a man walking a fine line between passion and madness, Nell must make an impossible choice between life, death, and life after death, where any mistake could be her last.