Two sisters, Codi (the main character) and Hallie are brought up by their father, the town doctor in isolated Grace, after their mother dies giving birth to Hallie. They grow up and escape from their controlling father who has been determined they will be better than poor Grace.

After graduating as a medic Codi drifts while Halie becomes a plant expert. The sisters are living together with Codi's boyfirend, an ER doctor, in Tuscon. When Hallie goes to Nicuragua to help the support the poeple in their fight against the american backed contras, Codi reutrns to Grace to keep an eye on their ailing father.

There she uncovers an ecological disaster unfolding as a legacy of the town's mining history and falls in love with an indian man. She uncovers a family history secret which her dying father has kept to himself - both her mother and father came from Grace, but her father had never acknowledged it.