Irene Fermi is different from other children.

Maybe it's the way she dresses or how she talks. Maybe it's the things she thinks. And while her sister is perfect, she is just the opposite.

Longing to be normal, Irene must learn how to hide, when to run, and who to fight. With her grandmother, weekend father, and shell-shocked uncle as allies, she counts each moment of calm as a victory.

Now a dying woman, Irene looks back on her life and unravels the knotted relationship with her mother and finds that she may have been wrong about everything.

In a world impossible to navigate, the true north of The Physics of Things is the triumph of love and the resilience of the human spirit.