Two motherless sisters--Bean and Liz--are shuttled to Virginia, where their Uncle Tinsley lives in the decaying mansion that's been in their family for generations. When school starts in the fall, Bean easily adjusts and makes friends, and Liz becomes increasingly withdrawn. Then something happens to Liz and Bean is left to challenge the injustice of the adult world.

It is 1970 in a small town in California. "Bean" Holladay is twelve and her sister, Liz, is fifteen when their artistic mother Charlotte, a woman "who found something wrong with every place she's ever lived," takes off to find herself, leaving her girls enough money to last a month or two. When Bean returns home from school one day and sees a police car outside the house, she and Liz decide to take the bus a bus to Virginia, where their Uncle Tinsley lives in the decaying mansion that's been in Charlotte's family for generations.