A disclaimer at the beginning of the book states that the story is pure fiction; however, the prologue and epilogue are convincingly real. In them Rushing refers to discussions with her grandmother (Joanna) and to a diary and letters of Isabel's. Rushing uses the diary as a devise to reveal Isabel's thoughts and feelings. Asides to the reader in several places in the book add to the realism. These devices make the story believable and the reader begins to wonder if those were really Jane Rushing's relatives with the names and places changed to protect their identities.

Rushing is capable of using words to paint vivid pictures of the landscape of her native Texas. She describes a hillside of wild flowers as "a long slope thickly spread with yellow butter."

Mesquite is described as gnarled "with its spreading, twisting black branches and on sunshiny morning in...