In Daddario’s novel, a young American woman trained in special-needs education finds herself embroiled in controversy over the treatment of the children in an orphanage in Romania.

The year is 1993, three years after the overthrow of the Ceaușescu government. Romania may now be “free,” but its people are still struggling economically and living with the fear of more Ceaușescu-like repressions. For the past 18 months, idealistic American Cassandra “Cassie” Belcher has been working at the Camin Spital at Basti orphanage for children who are physically and/or mentally disabled. As she observes a group of naked children—the most able-bodied of the young residents—frolicking by and in the polluted Suceava River, she spots Valentin, a teenage boy, climb on top of Florica, a teenage girl; the clumsy grappling of the two nearly adult bodies seems the product of a childlike mental capacity. Nearby, their caretakers pay little attention (“the staff wanted to keep cool and taking the ambulatory children for a dip in the river was as good an excuse to escape the stifling confines of the orphanage as one could conceive”). For Cassie, this is just one more example of the orphanage’s negligent treatment of its charges. As the story continues, readers will find that this is the least egregious of the indignities and tragedies the children will suffer, and Cassie will have to make some difficult choices. She lives in a one-bedroom house provided by the American founder of the orphanage, Gretchen Brinkley, an ambitious philanthropist who hopes her charitable works will lead to a prestigious government appointment. Cassie is friends with Irini, a young woman with a history of anti-Soviet political activism; she’s the Brinkley Foundation’s Romanian translator. Irini’s greatest desire is to move to America. Cassie is sharing her house with Teo, a frustrated artist hired by the Foundation to paint happy, Disney-like murals on the blank walls of the orphanage. Although professionally disgruntled, he establishes tender relationships with Valentin and an emotionally challenged 7-year-old named Cezar. Cassie is waiting for Daniel Walker to return from his visit to the States—she’s developed a close but not yet romantic friendship with the evangelical American who originally worked for the Foundation but is now setting up his own group home for boys.

Daddario’s disturbing novel is informed by her own 1993 visit to Romania as a humanitarian worker and her extensive experience in educating children with special needs. She vividly depicts the fears and scars left behind by the Ceaușescu reign of terror and the cruelty, poverty, and endemic corruption now reinforced by the new government headed by President Iliescu. (The orphanages were originally created by Ceaușescu to warehouse those he considered unfit for society.) Against this grim background, the author spins out the stories of her protagonists and, through short, occasionally humorous vignettes, those of the secondary characters. It’s a diverse cast of people, some with outsized egos, others plagued by broken dreams yet still clinging to hope. The meticulous prose, peppered with Romanian terminology and accompanying translations, deftly conveys the emotional weight carried by characters struggling against a broken system. The narrative also contains a bit of romance, a heavy dose of tragedy, and compelling details about methods for encouraging speech in formerly nonverbal children.

An informative cautionary tale, both heartbreaking and aspirational.