Leah
When Leah's daughter, Nyla, unexpectedly appears at her cabin in the Appalachian Mountains, it's a dream come true. For five years, Leah hasn't seen or heard from her daughter-ever since Nyla stormed out of the house, determined to go live with her idealized father.
Now she's back. But there's something different about Nyla. Something...off. And it's deeper than her unsettling appearance. As Leah struggles to reconnect with Nyla, she has more questions than answers. Where has she been? What happened to her? And more importantly, what is she hiding?
Nyla
Ever since her parents' divorce, Nyla longed to live with her charismatic father, Paul, who's the opposite of her frivolous and overbearing mother. So, at eighteen, after yet another argument with her mom, Nyla relocates to her dad's place in rural Tennessee.
She immediately falls in love with the slightly run-down, self-sustaining farmhouse that her father shares with a mixed collective of likeminded individuals. Secluded from society and self-contained, it's the simple life she's always wanted. Before long, she's encompassed in "the family," where everything is shared and everyone does their part. It's perfect.
Until Paul begins to govern with an ever-expanding list of rules . . . and punishments.