Rocky is an articulate, lively firstperson narrator. She observes the world shrewdly and speaks her mind frankly because she had to grow up quickly. Abandoned at birth, of mixedrace parentage, and handicapped by a stiff leg, Rocky lived in an orphanage for her first nine years, convinced that no adoptive parents would find her attractive. When an older couple, the Hemesvedts, adopts her, she finds her new parents kindly but distant. In Bolton, Rocky is a loner; she has no companions her age and possesses a jaundiced view of adults that she is not related to. Her only real friend is Python, a mongrel whom she saves from the pound. While not unhappy, Rocky is without special interests, aspirations, or direction in life.

Mick Strum gives her that direction.

Like Rocky, he is a loner and an iconoclast, but he has purpose in life...