Mariah, a widow struggling to raise her three children on a small farm in Midwestern Canada in the '30s, is determined to succeed alone. She works hard, along with her two young sons. Her little girl helps out when she's not busy dressing the family hound in doll clothes. Each night, Mariah talks to her dead husband's picture and tells him no one can ever take his place. No one, that is, until a weary traveler shows up at her gate and makes the devastating mistake of letting his shirt fall open...

Jonas has inherited a farm not far away and is on his way there because work in the city has dried up. The feisty woman from whom he asks a drink of water is more than he bargained for, but he returns to save her and her family from the prairie fire sweeping through the countryside, and their acquaintance only gets hotter.

Gloria Jean is a nurse/bluegrass musician/writer from Northern Ontario, Canada. She has written many articles and stories about rural life, including a long-running weekly humor/nostalgia column in local papers. In her spare time she enjoys time with her family, camping and fishing, skiing, and playing bluegrass music. One day, she hopes to retire from nursing to write full time in a cabin by the river.

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