Penelope Hale is hungry-- rib baring, aching belly starving. Abruptly dropped from the cushy heights of extreme wealth into the gaping jaws of the Great Depression, her family claws for any meager scrap of food they can get. She is determined to break out of the pattern society has set for her and create her own foundation. Alone. As Pip fights her way through a raging storm, she finds that food and water can only satisfy the belly. When she learns that her suffering could be the result of foul play, a more ravenous hunger takes over. She needs sustenance of a different sort, and she's simply starving for it.