A story of pioneers facing and overcoming appalling hardships and of a rebellious girl facing her own selfishness. When Torrie's father announced that he was uprooting his family from their com- fortable St Louis home and joining the covered wagon train to California, 1,500 miles across unknown country, Torrie was resentful and unhappy.
But on the dangerous and difficult journey, when the family face , not only hostile Indians but famine and epidemic, she learns the truth about her father's decision, and about herself. She also grows up enough to fall in love, first with the wrong man and then with the right one.