Finding her mother's wedding dress, ten-year-old Thea was sure she had discovered a treasure -- trying the gown on, she easily envisioned the beautiful bride her mother must have been. But when her mother discovered her with the dress, the sight unleashed a shattering rage -- the sting of her slap across Thea's face lasted a lifetime. Her mother's irrational anger, coupled with Thea's already strong feelings of disconnection toward her father and only sister Mickey, caused Thea to feel like an outsider in her own family. Married to a non-Jewish man, unable to have children and her parents now dead, Thea acquires eight letters by her grandmother to her grandmother's sister written in Yiddish in the l930s -- just before and after Thea's parents wedding. The cache of letters promises to answer some of Thea's life-long questions, but Mickey urges her not to have the letters translated. Trusting her own instincts, Thea has the letters deciphered and indeed begins to unravel the secrets of her own family. In the end, Thea faces some grave prospects in her life, as well as the multitude of questions raised by these letters -- questions about marriage, sisters, and what it means to belong.