GUYANA 1979-1980. Fleeing the capital from the groping hands of her parish priest, Guyanese Sister Barbara Lovell seeks refuge at their convent in Santa Cruz. Cocooned among the indigenous peoples within the remote northwest rainforest region of Guyana, she discovers that the Forest Spirits guard many dark secrets. Barbara, an art and geography teacher, joins the staff at the public high school in the township where American Sister Frances Adler teaches biology. The white nun from Ohio is obsessed with Father Geoffrey Goodman, the Santa Cruz British parish priest and her spiritual director. She considers Barbara, the beautiful captivating dark skin nun, as a threat to her special relationship with Geoffrey. While Frances grapples with Geoffrey's broodiness and the demons of the Vietnam War, Barbara struggles with sexual harassment at school from District Education Officer Douglas Simmons. Nothing misses the uncanny perception of the devious thirteen-year-old student Raven Mendonza, son of an indigenous Carib shaman. For his end-of-term art test, he paints a twisted circle. Glaring at Barbara from a turbulent sky is a large red eye. What does Raven see that remains hidden from view under the protective eye of a whitewashed Church?