A young woman named Anna travels to America from central Europe for an arranged marriage in the dawn of the 20th century. If humans will do nearly anything to avoid change in their lives, what motivates someone to leave her homeland and travel to an unknown land for a lifetime with a stranger? Her husband dies before his time, and unable to read or write English, she finds herself a penniless widow with six children to raise. Eventually, Anna and her family move into a house in a small, steel-mill city in western Pennsylvania-when U.S. Steel was on the rise. The house endows them with emotional security; so strong are their feelings for the structure, the house becomes an entity within itself. Anna's five daughters are the heroines of the tale as they pull together for the sake of their mother's dream, though each breaks a rule of the tight system that binds them together. Their story parallels America's as it becomes a world power, and urban life, the suburbs, the middle class, women and blacks change its landscape forever.
The story, a living testimony to family and human determination, is narrated by a member of the second generation of Americans.