Sipping latté in a NY café, Vilia is not surprised to hear that her mother has drowned herself back home in Australia, but she is shocked to learn she has now inherited a tropical island on the tip of Papua New Guinea, and it's from this remote region that her father disappeared mysteriously when she was just aged three.

Suddenly, reluctantly, Vilia is swept out of her fastidious Manhattan lifestyle and into the wild unpredictability of the Pacific. From the crowded streets of New York city to the remote Tubu Island and beyond, Vilia follows a series of tantalizing clues to uncover the truth about her father's vanishing. Did he run off with the missing hausgirl? Fall foul to a tragic accident? Or was there something darker, more sinister at play?

Along her journey of discovery, Vilia encounters the ancestors of proud headhunters, eccentric expatriates and an elusive witchdoctor with a story to tell. But is it a story she is willing to hear?

In this spellbinding mystery, Christina Larmer shows how searching for the truth far outweighs burying your head in the sand and hiding safely away.