Twelve-year-old Iris was named after the beached sei whale her grandparents found, who died as Iris was born. Iris is Deaf, like her maternal grandparents. Grandpa tells Iris that he thinks the beached whale was deaf too.

Unlike Iris and her grandparents, who were born Deaf, the whale likely lost its hearing from an explosion or a bomb test. As a result, the disorientated whale swam out of the ocean and into the Gulf of Mexico in search of sounds. Iris’s grandmother tried to save the whale, but it was futile, and people had to bury her on the beach.

Iris, who now lives in Houston, misses the beach and her old school, where some of the children were Deaf like her. Although she has been at her new school for two years, Iris continually feels like the new girl and hasn’t settled in at all.

Iris has a testy relationship with her teacher Ms. Conn, who handles Iris’s deafness insensitively. She tries to get Iris’s interpreter, Mr. Charles, to stop signing and make Iris lipread. In addition, Ms. Conn puts a girl named Nina, who has learned some patchy sign language, in charge of Iris’s learning.