At three years old, Garnet Raven is taken from his home on an Ojibway reserve and placed in a series of foster homes. In his mid-teens, he escapes at the first available opportunity only to find himself cast adrift on the streets of the big city, trying to avoid its bleak underbelly. By age twenty, Garnet is in jail. While there, he receives an unexpected letter from his long-forgotten native family, and the sudden communication from his past spurs him to return to the reserve following his release from jail. Deciding to stay awhile, Garnet's life is changed completely when he is initiated into the ways of the Ojibway - both ancient and modern - by Keeper, a friend of his grandfather, and one of the last founts of their people's history. Garnet comes to discover his sense of place - and of self.