As Jo helps her mother and her baby brother on a cold and windy Christmas Eve, she searches for shelter — any kind of shelter — for the little family. Her mother is ill and the baby needs feeding. There is no other option but a barn owned by a local farmer known as a solitary grouch. Nobody cares for Franklin Murdoch, and Jo doesn't trust him to care for her family. But Murdoch turns out to be less of a threat than Jo has feared. He makes the desperate family a warm sanctuary in his home. And when the wind has died and snow falls on Christmas morning, peace has come to them all. Stephanie McLellan's spare text is complemented by the subtle but beautiful art of Brooke Kerrigan in a book that is a reminder of the essential story of Christmas.