The heroine of The Bean Trees, Marietta (oth­erwise known as Miss Marietta, Missy, and Taylor Greer) is determined to avoid becoming a pregnant teen. Her early years in Eastern Kentucky have been heavily influenced by her perception that Pittman County is "behind the nation in practically every way you can think of, except the rate of teenage pregnancies." She has also been influenced by her supportive mother, and by her work with "blood and pee" in a hospital lab.

After saving enough money to buy a '55 Volkswagen bug, Taylor drives. away from .Pittman County. She renames herself Taylor Greer when she runs out of gas in Taylorville. Then she ac­quires an unwanted and abused Cherokee baby girl outside a bar in Oklahoma. She names the baby Turtle, for her habit of "holding on."

Taylor stops at the Broken Arrow motel, where...