During the Korean War, on a small island off the coast of California, Chico Flores scavenges a mysterious crate of daffodil bulbs that have washed ashore at Sucker’s Cove. He is delighted; he can sell the bulbs and make much-needed money to support his family. But these bulbs are different, alien even. They seem to click and hiss and have minds of their own, and when planted, they send up shoots unnaturally fast, swamping gardens, cracking through pavement, splitting the foundations of buildings. Very soon, the Island is facing a full-scale invasion, and as Chico and his family find themselves in the crosshairs of an irate community, the Islanders' long-standing rifts around race, class, and sexuality explode into the open. 

Piacentini’s lyrical novel about family, “invasion,” and heroism,  rifles through the tumult of love and the rubble of loss to examine the problems and possibilities of unexpected and inevitable change.

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