Connected via the fictional town of St Anne’s, a community along Nova Scotia’s western shore, each story takes its title from the children’s rhyme Counting Crows.

One for sorrow, two for joy, three for a message, four for a boy, five for silver, six for gold, seven for a secret never to be told. Within each tale an individual (often from the same family, always from the same town) will note the number of crows in their midst and recall the poem as it relates to the prophecy and the story at hand. Between the last century and the current one, the characters (for the most part, women) walk a shifting landscape carved out by war, poverty, and patriarchal expectations. Beneath the gaze of a small town and these intelligent birds whose memories are unforgiving, we are as close as a heartbeat to the souls upon these pages.