When Sofia and her family arrive in Ellis Island after a long and difficult journey from Italy, a cruel twist of fate separates Sofia from her parents and sends her to a "quarantine." There, in a state-run hospital, she and her new friend, Maureen, must learn to overcome the twin hardships of immigration and alienation, while they maintain the hope that they will be reunited with their families.

		Not bedtime - can't sleep. I am thinking all the time how this is like a nightmare come true. When we were at sea we were struck by a terrible storm a week out of Genoa. No one was allowed on deck. The ship creaked and moaned and every time it smacked down between the waves I swore it would break in two and I imagined drowning. Gabriella and Luca and I talked how if indeed the ship began to sink we would all hold hands. We would never let go of each other's hands no matter how hard the sea tore at us. We would go to the very bottom together. We would drown and die together wrapped in each other's arms. I thought until now drowning was the worst thing I could imagine. But this, this quarantine is worse. It is another kind of death, I think, and I hold no one's hand and no one holds mine. There are no arms to wrap me tight. I am completely and utterly alone. To be so alone and to have no one to tell you where you family is or if you will every see them again is indeed a kind of death. I am sleepy now, but they never turn off the lights in the hallway. I see squiggles under my eyelids if I close them. Hard to sleep.