With the scholarship to the music conservatory in her hand, Ginny Webster was ready to take on the world, until her Aunt Clara, who lives in the Blue Ridge Mountains, became ill and Ginny goes there to be her nurse.
Crazy, unreal experiences await her: from her car breaking down short of her destination, to the horse and buggy ride to the Dorwall's hillbilly home where she meets Burt, their city cousin, to her aunt, whom she fears is dead and her ram shackled cold house without electricity, water, heat, or food. It is permeated with an awful odor and there is no sign of her wild, moonshining cousin, Ronald.
The Dorwalls', but especially Burt, come to her rescue repeatedly, providing sustenance, security, and money. Ginny finds love and caring from her new friends, especially from Burt, with whom mutual love develops.
Ginny does her best to heal her aunt, who is beside herself with fear over the whereabouts of her son Ronald. Is he in hiding, running moonshine, or perhaps, dead. Whose hand did Ginny find in the refrigerator?
Burt left the mountains, and as Clara healed and didn't need her anymore, and the Dorwalls no longer visit, her young heart is broken. She has much to face before she discovers that mountain magic is both a portent of things to come as well as a foretaste.