Crow Talk by Eileen Garvin is centered on three souls finding their way out of turmoil. Frankie has been fascinated by birds, especially crows, since childhood. She was working on her masters in ornithology, studying spotted owls, with an esteemed University of Washington professor.

But it went off the rails when he asked her to work for a colleague studying crows. He is making it more than difficult for her to earn her degree. So Frankie, although it's late summer, heads to the family cabin on a lake at the base of Mount Adams.

Situated near both Mount Rainier and Mount St. Helens, Adams is in reality one of those perfectly shaped peaks that is seen from most of central Washington and parts of Oregon. Her late grandmother ran a little store there that she and her older brother worked at summers.

The cabin is more home than the family home in Hood River, Oregon. She thinks she is alone at the head of the remote lake, but one of the other cabins along that part of the shore also is occupied late in the season. It's the most opulent cabin, owned by a wealthy Seattle newspaper family.

Anne Magnuson, married to the scion of the family, is there with her husband, Tim, and their five-year-old, Aiden. Anne, a music singer, composer and educator from Ireland, is still recovering from the sudden death of her best friend. She should have gone to Seattle on a scholarship instead of Anne, so her dying back home hits Anne especially hard.

It's had an effect on her teaching and her parenti.