Set in the unmatched natural beauty of the Blue Ridge Mountains, The Sparks Fly Upward chronicles the life of young Nate Miller as he enters into manhood and leaves the protection of his ancestral home in Idlewild. Caught in the tension between tradition and new thinking, and wrestling with his own demons, Nate journeys into the larger world of college life in 1970s America, and the course of his life is changed forever in the process.