For 15-year-old Sarah Owen, having a scientist father is a blessing and a curse. He doesn't bat an eye at her psychic abilities, since he researches them; and she knows more about the invisible worlds of microbes, electricity, and gravity than most girls in the 17th Century. But when Sarah travels to the Americas with her father to do more research, she's shipwrecked and lands for a time on the Gullah Islands. Later, when the plantation owners find her and send her north to Salem, Massachusetts, her abilities get her into trouble.