The following version of this book was used to create the guide: Hostetter, Joyce Moyer. Blue. Calkins Creek, 2006.

The novel opens in Hickory, North Carolina in 1944. Ann Fay Honeycutt lives with her mother Myrtle, her father Leroy, her twin sisters Ida and Ellie, and her younger brother Bobby. They live on a farm, but their father has to leave to go fight overseas in World War II. Leroy gives Ann Fay, the oldest, overalls and tells her that she is the man of the house while he is away. Ann Fay takes this responsibility very seriously. He tells Bobby to make sure that he plays at least a little bit every day.

Ann Fay works hard in their garden, and she prompts her sisters and brother to help her as well. Still, she remembers that Leroy told Bobby to take some time every day to play, and she feels a bit of guilt for pushing him. She is desperate for their help and quite frustrated when the younger three do not readily provide it. Suddenly she hears a scream, and Bobby is quite ill. He is taken to the hospital via a hearse because there is a shortage of ambulances. Myrtle goes with him. He has polio.

Despite not being able to be with Bobby because he is in the contagious ward, Myrtle stays at the hospital. They need volunteers, and she does not want to leave her son. Bobby is placed in an iron lung. It is hard for the children to get news of their brother especially because the only people nearby who have a phone will not let the Honeycutts in to use it because they fear polio. One day Ann Fay convinces Junior to take her father’s truck and drive her and her sisters to the hospital. They are able to see their mother very briefly before they are kicked out, but they see Pete, Bobby’s dog, outside the hospital.

Eventually, Myrtle comes home with Bobby’s body. He has died. Reverend Price and Lottie from church come along with Junior and his mother Bessie to be with the family. Ann Fay likes the people around because it has just been her and her sisters for quite some time. Other friends like Ann Fay’s best friend Peggy Sue as well as the Hinkle sisters are not there because they are afraid of catching polio. Junior and Ann Fay make a box for Bobby’s body to go in, and they bury him underneath a mimosa tree.

Myrtle has difficulty many days functioning, and Ann Fay feels like she has become a mother to her mother. She convinces Junior to help her smuggle her sisters to their grandparents’ home even though her grandparents’ home state does not allow people from the polio areas to enter. They manage to get around a police officer and carry out this task. Ann Fay continues to care for her mom and the farm when she suddenly comes down with polio.

Ann Fay is brought to the polio hospital where she meets Imogene, a Black girl whose bed is beside her own. Ann Fay is not used to Black people being in the same area as white people because of segregation, but out of necessity, authorities have had to put all races together in the contagious wards. The two become fast friends but are eventually separated when they are no longer contagious because Ann Fay is sent to a ward only for white people while Imogene is sent to the colored ward. The two eventually get a hospital worker to deliver letters to each other, and they are able to meet up outside one day.

All of the children are big fans of President Roosevelt because he had polio and is in a wheelchair. Ann Fay hopes to see him one day, but then they learn of his death. The white children get a yellow rose when his casket goes through town, but she gives it to Imogene because she knows her friend deserves it just as much as she does. Eventually Ann Fay is able to use crutches to get around, and she is told she can go home. She does not see her mother pull up, and she is surprised to hear her father’s voice. He has come home from war and has driven with Myrtle to take Ann Fay home after having been released from the war because of an injury. He has a bad arm, and Ann Fay has a bag leg, and they are able to drive their truck home together.