Born in 1947 to parents with scant formal education, Vangie Cawthern nevertheless values school and learning. Her Daddy, Earl, thinks formal education unimportant, and early on he ignores and dismisses Vangie's school efforts; and later on he openly opposes them.

Vangie's younger sister, Nadine, with her lethal jealousy, threatens to derail Vangie's inner drive to study and learn.

Vangie's sometimes buffer between her Daddy and sister is her Mama, Aniebel; and when she dies, Vangie is left alone to overcome her sister's spite and her Daddy's open sabotage of her finishing high school and going to college.