Some people have a home that feels like a place from a fairytale — and Grandma Rose is one of those people.

Her old, slightly crooked house at the edge of Glimmerwood Forest is exactly what a grandmother’s house should be: with a tin roof that rattles when it rains, a porch swing that creaks in a friendly sort of way, and kitchen drawers full of things you didn’t expect to find but somehow always need. It smells like fresh bread and woodsmoke — and Rose herself smells like cinnamon and lavender. Whoever arrives there feels at home immediately.

With her gray hair tied back in a messy bun, her beloved green apron with the strawberry-shaped patch, and the way she waves both arms over her head when she greets someone, Grandma Rose looks like a perfectly ordinary grandmother. She makes vegetable soup, picks tomatoes in the garden, tells jokes that nobody finds funny except herself — and when the moment calls for it, she laces up her sturdy boots, puts on her wide-brimmed hat, and sets off into the forest as though she never forgot how.

Because Rose carries something inside her that the years have not erased: a quiet, unshakeable curiosity. A way of looking at the world that is sharper than it first appears. And when she gazes out toward Glimmerwood — thoughtful, a little faraway — you get the feeling that she is remembering something. Something she has never quite forgotten.

What that is, and what Grandma Rose has to do with the mysterious heart of Glimmerwood — that is her story. And it belongs to her alone.

Until Lily and Max spend a summer starting to ask the right questions