The Meaning of Isolated Objects

Scott has lived all of his life traveling between the United States and Afghanistan, doing solitary and dangerous CIA work in the dusty Afghani mountains, only returning to the Blue Ridge of Virginia to check on his house and daughter Wendell, an archaeologist obsessed with finding clues to the past.

Both father and daughter still grieve the loss of wife and mother Lynnie, who died giving birth to Wendell, but they compensate by living reckless, hedonistic lives, seeking solace in nature and short-lived sexual encounters which they keep secret from one another.

Wendell packs up and heads to the hill country of Texas on a whim and a desire to make a fresh start. Things unravel as she discovers she is being followed and finds notes from a mysterious man who seems to know her.

Vulnerable with worry over Wendell, Scott lets his characteristic guard down. Suddenly he finds himself falling in love, looking for a lost daughter, and trying to keep one step ahead of Wendell when he realizes she is being pursued because of abilities she doesn’t even know she has, a technique known as remote viewing, which he learned and practiced in a secret government unit.

As family secrets emerge, father and daughter are on the run, piecing together the painful, but redemptive, puzzle of grief, love, and loss.

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"Do you have authors whose work you ration, forcing yourself to find breathing space in other books between times, lest you read their entire bibliography back-to-back in only a few days? I do, which is the only reason I haven't yet read everything Billie Hinton has written.

I found this book both gripping and charming; I didn't want to put it down. It had dark moments, but the overall tone was hopeful, shining a light on love as well as on pain and dysfunction."

Rachel Cotterill, author of Rebellion, book one in the Chronicles of Charanthe