Thirteen-year-old Erica Pickins does not want to play the piano—and she definitely does not want to go to England. But her father must take family and students for a fall semester abroad, and her mother insists she still practice, every day.

“Llorona was no harmless little pigeon. She was the lechuza, the owl you see just before someone is about to die, the one that haunts you in your dreams and you never want to see in real life because it means you are about to lose someone you love.”