Benne Seed Island

Benne Seed Island is one of two primary settings in the novel. It is where the O'Keefe's live and it is also the site of Beau Allaire, the mansion where Maximiliana Horne and Ursula Heschel live. It is a beautiful island now undergoing unsightly development, with large buildings tracts. Polly and her family live in a converted hotel, with each member of the family having his or her own room. Polly and her siblings take a boat with their father every morning to Cowpertown, from where they take a bus to their high school.

Athens

The book toggles between the past in Benne Seed Island and the present in Greece for much of the novel. Polly spends three days alone in Athens because her aunt and uncle are delayed and are unable to meet her flight there as planned. It is in Athens that Polly...