It is 1943, and 11-year-old Dewey Kerrigan is traveling west on a train to live with her scientist father--but no one will tell her exactly where he is. When she reaches Los Alamos, New Mexico, she learns why: he's working on a top secret government program.

"Eleven-year-old Melody has a photographic memory. Her head is like a video camera that is always recording. Always. And there's no delete button. She's the smartest kid in her whole school -- but NO ONE knows it. Most people -- her teachers and doctors included -- don't think she's capable of learning, and up until recently her school days consisted of listening to the same preschool-level alphabet lessons again and again and again. If only she could...

A third prophecy, this time involving a leopard, comes true for eleven-year-old Martine, an orphaned South African girl who has mystical healing powers over animals, when she travels with her grandmother and best friend Ben to Zimbabwe.