You are a small thing, and you must learn to fight. Swiv has taken her grandmother's advice too literally. Now she's at home, suspended from school. Mom is pregnant and preoccupied—and so Swiv is in the older woman's charge, receiving a very different form of education from a teacher with a style all her own. Grandma likes her stories fast, troublesome and funny. She's known the very worst that life can throw at you—and has met it every time with a wild, unnamable spirit, fighting for joy and independence every step of the way. But will maths lessons based on Amish jigsaws and classes on How to Dig a Winter Grave inspire the same fire in Swiv, and ensure it never goes out? Time is running short. Grandma's health is failing, the baby is on the way, as a family of three extraordinary women prepare to face life's great changes together.