In Silver Springs, Arizona, her mother's stories of the monstrous La Llorona are thrilling but unbelievable to science-loving Paola until she and her best friends Dante and Emma take a walk through a cactus field near the Gila River.

TEHLOR KAY MEJIA is the author of the critically acclaimed young adult fantasy novel We Set the Dark on Fire, as well as its forthcoming sequel, We Unleash the Merciless Storm, and Miss Meteor (co-written with National Book Award nominee Anna-Marie McLemore). Their debut novel received six starred reviews, and was chosen as anIndie's Next Pick and a Junior Library Guild selection, as well as being an Indiebound bestseller in the Pacific Northwest region. It has been featured in Seventeen, Cosmopolitan, and O by Oprah Magazine's, and named a best book of 2019 by Kirkus and School Library Journal. Tehlor lives in Oregon with their daughter, two very small dogs, and several rescued houseplants.