Matilda Avalon Klein introduces herself as the only child of Isadora Hirschel Klein. Isadora escaped her critical parents young and has always told Matilda she is better off without a father. Midway through the summer after Matilda graduates high school, she receives an email from Kingsley Cello, an artist who identifies himself as her father and invites her to visit his home, Hidden Beach, on Martha’s Vineyard. He says he wants to give her a painting.

Matilda has never known her father’s name before and feels a hum of excitement. She searches for him online and discovers Kingsley Cello is an extremely famous living painter. Search results describe him as known for darkly controversial neoclassical paintings with fairy-tale influences. His 2012 painting, Prince of Denmark, caused a scandal at the Whitney Museum. He is reclusive, and his paintings average $2 million in value.

Matilda texts her mother about Kingsley’s email. Isadora describes him as not a good person—strange, obsessive, and wounded—but confirms he is Matilda’s father. She expresses surprise that he found them and asks if he mentioned her.

Matilda continues researching Kingsley online. Art magazines use lurid descriptors and label him the enfant terrible of 21st-century neoclassicism. His Wikipedia entry notes he gives different birth dates to interviewers and claims no formal art schooling. His early paintings featured audacious nudes in mundane activities. Later work referencing literature and fairy tales became controversial for eroticizing suffering. Kingsley has given contradictory life stories to journalists, claiming various origins from Italy to the Midwest to a Swedish sanatorium to being raised by “queer” fishermen in Alaska. Viewing his paintings online, Matilda sees turbulent seas, burned forests, monsters, and crumbling castles. Then she discovers a painting of her mother.

The painting shows a burning stone castle with Isadora, depicted as Persephone, escaping through smoke while laughing with fatigue and wonder. Isadora calls, and Matilda immediately questions her about it. When Matilda explains Kingsley’s invitation and offer of a painting, Isadora urges her to sell the painting, but Matilda refuses, wanting to keep her only connection to her father. Isadora explains she modeled for Kingsley when she was in college but insists she hasn’t heard from him since before Matilda’s birth and didn’t give him Matilda’s contact information. Matilda is angry her mother never mentioned the famous painting, which now hangs in the Saint Louis Museum of Art. Isadora warns Matilda not to visit, calling Kingsley difficult and cautioning her not to be his plaything. Matilda asks what happened between them.

Isadora tells Matilda she met Kingsley when she was 19 and he was 43 or older. While a student at Fordham, Isadora modeled for an art class at Cooper Union, where Kingsley, a friend of the teacher, saw student paintings of her. He offered to make a real painting of her. Though Isadora expected payment, money was never discussed. Instead, she moved into his Brooklyn warehouse studio and lived with him for three months, sharing his bed.

Days after Kingsley told her to pack her things, Isadora discovered she was pregnant. Angry arguments revealed he was seeing another woman, and he refused to help with the pregnancy or baby. Kingsley disappeared from the loft before Matilda was born. After her parents were cruel to her, Isadora moved in with another single mother, then met a sculptor and moved to Santa Fe. Years later, she learned Kingsley’s painting of her sold for over $4 million to a private collector who donated it to a museum. She never received a penny.

Matilda explains she no longer lives with her mother because Isadora is, at heart, a muse or groupie for male artists. Though Isadora performed motherly duties, she never truly enjoyed being a mother. At 38, Isadora looks like a tree nymph—earthy, feral, and magical—and attracts sophisticated creative men. Matilda admires her mother’s strength but is repulsed by her need for male validation.

Matilda recounts her transient childhood moving between the homes of Isadora’s artist lovers: a sculptor in Santa Fe until she was three, a video artist, an installation artist in Rome who abandoned them when Matilda was six, an English ceramicist who rescued them, and a folk singer-songwriter. After recounting a series of Isadora’s lovers, Matilda notes they lived with seven other men, leading to many different schools. Matilda found solace in video games.

When Matilda was 15, they met Saar Adler, a 40-year-old actor with a regular role on the TV show Highly Classified. Unlike Isadora’s previous lovers, Saar was content with his stable life in a Venice Beach bungalow. After Isadora slept with an American sculptor she met at a dinner party, she moved to Mexico City with him. Matilda, now 18, refused to go. She wanted to stay for her boyfriend, Luca, and her friends. She was also in the middle of submitting her college applications for video game design programs. Saar invited her to stay with him to finish her senior year.

After Isadora leaves in November, Matilda feels intense anger about her itinerant childhood and her mother’s abandonment. Saar is heartbroken, having believed he and Isadora would marry. He copes by eating chocolate cake and playing video games but remains highly responsible, never missing work or exercise. Isadora texts Matilda frequently, expressing happiness in Mexico City but never asking about Saar. Matilda feels her mother disappearing from her life.

During winter holidays, Matilda celebrates Hanukkah with Saar’s family in Oregon. By January, she has submitted all her college applications. Saar starts dating again, seeing a makeup artist named Nicki, then a UCLA professor named Serena. In April, Matilda is accepted into UC Irvine’s game design program. Saar buys her a college sweatshirt and helps with housing applications. Matilda gets a job at a coffee shop and plans to work full-time until school starts. She describes herself as coping but raging and bereft, trying to be an adult while feeling like a lost little girl. Then Luca breaks up with her.

In his car on the way to a party, Luca breaks up with Matilda while she passionately discusses a video game called Killer Odyssey and sketches eyeball weapons in her notebook. He tells her she is a lot—obsessive about gaming, filled with anger at her mother, and talking too much. Matilda realizes she has missed warning signs of his disinterest. Luca continues listing her flaws: She’s too needy, driven, and opinionated, with her feelings always on the surface.

After breaking up with her, Luca suggests they still attend the party. Matilda refuses and asks him to take her home, but he declines. Furious, she insults him, calling him a bad listener who isn’t smart enough for her and a weak, self-sabotaging slacker. Luca abandons her and goes into the party. With no other option and no money for a long car service ride, Matilda drives his car home and leaves it parked near Saar’s bungalow with the key inside. The next day, Luca sends furious texts. He turns their mutual friends against her, and they cut ties. Matilda is left completely isolated.

Matilda receives a second email from Kingsley with cryptic directions involving a strawberry and the instruction not to be afraid of “glum.“ Saar thinks Kingsley’s refusal to pay for travel is a bad sign but insists on buying Matilda’s plane ticket. After nearly 24 hours of travel consuming only junk food, Matilda arrives on Martha’s Vineyard via an eight-seater plane. During the flight, she hopes her father will be the understanding person she needs.

Immediately after landing, Matilda becomes violently ill in the airport bathroom. Two girls her age, Holland Terhune and Winnie, hear her vomiting and offer help. Holland mentions Matilda looks familiar and references something she showed Winnie on her phone. Holland explains she and her friends are renting a house up-island for the summer and invites Matilda to hang out. Holland and Winnie exchange contact information with Matilda before leaving to meet an incoming plane.

Matilda approaches a dented taxi van driven by a sullen, sunburned boy her age. She gives him her destination: South Road at the strawberry. The driver, worried about complaints to his boss if he drops her at the wrong place, initially refuses the fare. Matilda offers extra money. He negotiates for $15 extra, paid upfront, and she agrees.

Matilda sits in the front seat next to the hostile driver. In the back, passengers discuss a fire five days ago on Beechwood, a private island owned by Harris Sinclair of a local wealthy family. A house burned down and three teenagers died. Passengers speculate about the cause while noting the sole survivor, a girl named Cadence, supposedly doesn’t know what happened.      

The driver drops Matilda at a mailbox painted with a strawberry. She receives a text from Holland saying Winnie thinks she’s hot and inviting her over. Matilda replies she’s interested only as friends. She finds an unmarked driveway where elaborate stonework spells out Kingsley’s last name.

A large shaggy gray dog appears, growling. Remembering the email’s instruction, Matilda calls the dog Glum, and the animal immediately calms and befriends her. Glum leads her to a clearing with a garage containing a dusty vintage Mercedes. Beyond it stands the house: a wooden castle with four cylindrical towers, glass walls, unmowed lawns, and a vegetable garden, with the Atlantic Ocean sparkling beyond. Matilda has arrived at Hidden Beach.