Using five perspectives, author Sharon Wagner tells a story about
-two young people, Esme and Joseph, who knew each other when they were in kids with their families in Guatemala. Both kids' fathers are archeologists studying ruins in the country. The pair are reunited after a disastrous televised session on a morning show where Esme tries to land her first big break as a magician.
-Esme's father Oliver as he and Joseph's father Michael travel through the jungle and talk about their feelings for their children, their marriages and their work.
-two alien beings, Dob Dec and Sula, who are part of a larger group, are eager to study Earth. One of the aliens can levitate things, and loves playing games, while the other is a healer. We learn of their long journey to the planet and their relationships.

Dob Dec's chapters and later also Sula's are interspersed with Esme's and Joseph's, as we see Esme and Joseph discover they have weird, otherworldly powers (levitation and mindreading), while their fathers discover something world changing at a dig.

So, this is a novel with a plot with interesting features and concepts. The aliens' chapters were particularly engaging, making Dob Dec and Sula fascinating and compelling characters. Their chapters were fantastic.

Now for the things that didn't work for me:
-Though I know I was supposed to empathize with the two young people, I never really cared about them. I did like hearing about all the delicious meals Joseph cooked, though.

-The humans' dialogue, particularly Esme's and Joseph's, felt stilted, and often too long, and filled with several irrelevancies to the plot.

-I never got the sense that the Guatemalan-set scenes were actually occurring in the country.

-The novel was too long. I think this would have worked better as a tightly written novella. My attention kept wandering as I read, and I kept wondering, "are we there yet?", frustrated to get to when the author tied the four characters' threads together. Unfortunately, with the uneven pacing and overabundance of needless details, my interest waned well before I got to the end.

Thank you to Netgalley and to Ten16 Press for this ARC in exchange for my review.

I was initially drawn by the fantastic cover art, I think it looks really lovely. The book is a supernatural mystery about a character called Esme Wright who can levitate objects. It starts with Esme trying to show her talent live on tv but it all goes terribly wrong.

This is a story of love and mystery with different povs to keep it interesting. I liked the icing and would recommend this book.

This was a beautifully done scifi novel, it had that concept that I was looking for based on the description. I enjoyed the way the characters were created and how they were used in this universe. I enjoyed the use of levitation powers and how it worked in this universe.