Beka reflects on the tumultuous past few months, beginning with her failure to pass the term, on her penchant for lying, the stories of “befo time” and political unrest, her great-gran‘s death and wake, a hurricane, and most troubling, the gulf widening between them as Troycie‘s inability to cope with ruinous events causes a breakdown. Beka‘s intelligence and contrariness see her (and the reader) through what could have been just a miserable tale.