The book, although a fiction novel, is based loosely on the real story of an adopted baby girl from India, recalling some of her trials and tribulations growing up different. She was bullied and subject to racist comments during her elementary and middle school years, based on her skin color and some of her special mannerisms.
In the orphanage she was named "Mayavati," after a Hindu Goddess by the staff caring for her and the other orphans.
As a teenager, Mayavati encountered an apparition that was also an Indian girl who was bullied and murdered at the same high school years earlier. The story follows Maya through exploring questions about her abandonment, adoption, her special gifts, the encounter with the apparition, her investigation into the death, and the re-opening of the alleged accidental death of the apparition.
Simply, it is a combination of good vs. evil, mystical powers of both girls and how they are aided by today's law enforcement officers utilizing current technology in solving the apparition's murder from the 1980's.
Both Maya and the apparition discover they are very similar, initially disagreeing and eventually ending up as close as sisters could be, even though one is an apparitional form.
The central issues in the story are bullying, arrogance, entitlement, hard work and the important message of tolerance.