Book excerpt: In the Okefenokee Swamp grows a rare and beautiful flower with a power unlike any other. Many have tried to claim it???no one has come out alive. But fourteen-year-old Piper Canfield is desperate, and this flower may be her only chance to keep a promise she made a long time ago. Accompanied by her little brother, Creeper, her friend Tad, and two local guides, Piper embarks on the quest of a lifetime. But there's a deadly predator lurking unseen in the black water, one nearly as old as the Oke itself. Some say it's a monster. Others say an evil spirit. The truth is far more terrifying. Piper's task is simple: find the flower . . . or die trying.