Plump, unattractive, and underachieving, Sharon Mathers isn't the kind of girl usually found in glossy women's magazines. She is the kind of girl found reading them, usually while drinking beer in the backroom of her friend's double-wide trailer/beauty parlor. Born to a single mother in a small town where family ties run "deep enough to be genetically suspect," Sharon grew up on the social fringe. Unfortunately, marrying a hometown boy and "by extension, almost half of the town," didn't help. Sharon's longing for deep and authentic ties of kinship takes her farther and farther from her Alabama home town in search of a real "home." Her journey leads her to the sweaty, boozy, sexy streets of the French Quarter and on to the golden prairies of Oklahoma where silver fighter jets pierce a perfect blue sky. Passing through the surreal, nightmarish aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, she ultimately discovers a place of acceptance she never expected.