Inspired by Fyodor Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov, this novel is an imagining of the story through the eyes of a modern-day Katerina Ivanovna Verkhovsteva. After receiving a shocking piece of news, 27-year old Russian-American artist Kat struggles to accept that a tightly-held childhood dream will likely never come true. Urged by her Aunt Yulia, Kat decides to spend six months teaching in the Republic of Tatarstan, Russia in hopes that a new adventure will help her to embrace the unexpected life placed before her. Life in Tatarstan turns out to be more of a nightmare than an adventure though, and Kat finds the bitterness toward God that she had tried to leave in America growing by the day. When the handsome, unpredictable Dima begins to pursue her, he seems to be the freedom Kat has been longing for. As Kat is drawn into Dima's tumultuous world, however, she realizes just how wrong she was.