On the Altiplano, the high plain, between Chile and Bolivia, Fallon's family witnesses their mother magically disappear. The inexplicable nature of their loss marks each family member in a different way. For Fallon it is the first step toward adulthood. For her brilliant and troubled older brother, it is an abandonment from which he never recovers. Thirteen years later, back in the United States, Fallon is about to conquer self-doubt and apply to medical school, when another mysterious event shatters her reality. The crisis catapults her across the country on a quest to find the truth. What she discovers changes everything.
Blurring boundaries between make-believe and fact, Blue Woman Burning, asks what is real, what is invented? How can we move forward if what passes for reality is only a matter of perception? This is a novel for our time, as the conflict between what we choose to believe and what is true plays out in modern American life.