Nonsense and candy and the families we choose in the origin story of a beloved character in the latest installment of the Hugo Award-winning Wayward Children series. Before there was Sumi, Promised Savior of Confection, there was Onishi Sumiko, a girl with no idea where she belonged. Onishi Sumiko was born to be an invisible girl. The second child of immigrant parents, overshadowed by her brother, she seemed destined for a life of quiet obedience, never breaking free of the path that had been chosen for her. Until a chance encounter with an impossible door sends her tumbling into a world of peppermint dreams and sugary nightmares, leaving her trapped in a candy-coated heart of darkness. Forced to adapt to the world of Confection, where the rules are as unpredictable as they are nonsensical, Sumiko must decide whether she's going to be a meek, logical victim of her own fate-or whether she's going to stand up and become the illogical, impossible hero she was always meant to be. Not all sweet dreams are safe ...