It's 1942 and World War II looms over the lives of the Cooper family: a son in the fight whose pregnant Irish war bride arrives at their isolated Montana town; a son married to a Blackfeet woman whose return tears open racial tension just when people must work together for the war effort. Their father, Leo, a preacher and philosophizing beekeeper, models a vision for the community based on the society of the hives. His longtime friend, Jereldene "Doc" Jesperson, holds the valley together, curing bodies and tending souls. And Josie Shines the Light, a Blackfeet grandmother, must rely on Leo and his son to safeguard her granddaughter in this troubled settler valley. A mysterious figure roams at night and Maire, the war bride, must gather her courage to save her husband's ravaged soul. This is a dramatic family saga of generations daring to ask the questions that shape their destinies.