When Alma Cruz, a celebrated writer, inherits a small plot of land in the Dominican Republic, her homeland, she has the idea of turning it into a place to bury her untold stories - literally. She creates a graveyard for manuscript drafts and revisions, and the characters whose lives she tried and failed to bring to life. Alma wants her characters to rest in peace, but they have other ideas. The characters defy their author: they talk back to her and talk to one another behind her back, rewriting and revising themselves. Finally, Alma finds the meaning she and her characters yearn for in the everlasting vitality of stories.