San Francisco ghostwriter Ruth Young finally begins to understand her Alzheimer's-afflicted mother LuLing's preoccupation with ghosts and curses when she reads LuLing's writings of her dark backwoods childhood in 1920s China-- where LuLing's mute, disfigured nursemaid committed suicide, and a nearby cave held what may have been the bones of the lost ancient hominid Peking Man.

Sisters Junan and Yinan form a pact after their mother's suicide never to be apart, which endures until Junan enters into a marriage of convenience with a soldier who puts even more distance between the young women when he has an affair with Yinan.