The time is 1872. The place is New York City. Horace Carpetine has been raised to believe in science and rationality. So as apprentice to Enoch Middleditch, a society photographer, he thinks of his trade as a scientific art. But when wealthy society matron Mrs. Frederick Von Macht orders a photographic portrait, strange things begin to happen. Horace's first real photographs reveal a frightful likenes: it's the image of the Von Macht's dead daughter, Eleanora. Rich in detail, full of the magic of early photography, here is a story about the shadows, visible and invisible, that are always lurking near.