A collection of short stories includes the title story, in which a famous writer, who just learned he may have a brain tumor, must decide how to care for his distant, American Indian father who is slowly dying.

The magical story of friendship between twenty-something Sylvia Hardy and Lydie Jim, an eighty-two year old Tlingit elder from the Yukon. As students at the University of British Colombia, Syliva and Lydie met a year ago when the younger woman agreed to be Lydie's tutor. Lydie's warmth and irrepressible charm work their way past all of Sylvia's boundaries. Struggling with guilt and loss after a terrible event in her childhood, Sylvia finds in Lydie...

A lonely hunter finds his wishes for a companion and successful hunting season coming true until he disobeys the command of his mysterious winter wife and takes a summer wife, too.