Born mentally challenged, Nettie Vancouver, an eight-year-old with an unusual gift, lives in a world all her own. Set in 1864 during the Civil War, she leads an idyllic life as Virginia’s only surviving child on a small farm, nestled deep in the backwoods of rural Kansas with her dog Rusty and a horse named Teddy that she befriends after healing him from a deadly disease.

But when her father is killed in battle, Nettie's mother decides to journey west and start a new life. Heartbroken, Nettie must leave Teddy behind, and Virginia’s dreams of a better life fade into despair when they are attacked by a tribe of Sioux Indians along the fringes of the Oregon Trail. Captured and disoriented, she helps Nettie escape, yet only to discover, that savage Indians had tortured her only daughter.

Virginia, now grief-stricken, finds a way to atone for Nettie's captivity, first through a dream, and later when she calls on Nettie to save her from certain death at the hands of the Sioux.

The story's main themes are temptation and redemption, but it is richly fringed with many others. From the beginning, we understand how Virginia is torn between her desires for love, her escapades, and her desire to live a Godly life. She feigns the life of a prude in order to be seen as a virtuous woman in the eyes of others, but deep inside she is anything but that. She cavorts with the Reverend of her beloved Church, where the narrator tells us that, 'she never misses a Sunday morning sermon'.

Many themes are explored; such as the illness and death of a child and how one might deal with that kind of loss. In this case, Virginia transfers her pain into something positive in her life; she sees her daughter as her guardian angel; closer in death than in life.

On a broader scale, the story also touches on the friction between Indians and Whites during the Civil War era; while hinting that nothing much has changed since, as it alludes to race relations in general. Another theme is that of a life interrupted. What happens when your life is turned upside-down? Derailed, and uprooted in an unwanted direction. Can you survive, and if you do, how will this unexpected path change your beliefs?

At its core, this unusual story posits an even more intriguing question. A paradox to a very human dilemma: loss. And that is to say, the loss of all things. Most of us are driven with big dreams and high hopes. Goals that many people achieve in their lifetime. But here, the author shows us the other side of success. The darker side of life. The side where most things are lost, which is indeed the case for Virginia Vancouver who soon learns that not everyone makes it. Not everyone succeeds beyond their wildest dreams. Sometimes loss is all there is to be had.

The story's underlying premise rings true in the end. One's fate might be sealed in the opposite direction from one's intentions. As life often teaches, sometimes one is not chosen to change the world, but the world has chosen to change one instead.
A myriad of obstacles are carefully layered, but Virginia's deepest fear is that she will never be loved, and that she will never find true happiness, yet on the surface, her capture by savage Indians remains her foremost hurdle. And within that framework, she must conquer enslavement, repeated death threats, hunger and thirst, a cloud of oppression, and lastly, she must deal with a woman's most unthinkable attack.

The story is one of conflicting choices, harsh losses that weaves its way to a dramatic end with a poignant twist that questions everything these heroic characters believed in, and everything they had fought to live for.