A few days in early summer for the Delevan family.

Ben, the oldest brother, is in charge of the family business, a textile mill. The business is making a profit but on tenuous ground. He’s got an offer from another company that will allow him to retire in comfort. His marriage to Wilma is satisfactory but not spectacular. His college son Brock got himself messed up with a girl in college and came home in disgrace. He’s trying to put his life back together and slowly succeeding. Ben’s daughter Ellen almost got messed up with her boyfriend, but was smart enough to pull out of it at the last minute.

Ben’s brother Quinn works at the mill, but is a weak man who accomplishes nothing. He’s totally intimidated by his wife Bess, a strong, confident woman who has a son from a former marriage who has learning disabilities. Quinn is having an affair with Bonny, a girl from the mill.

Alice, Quinn’s twin sister, lives with her husband George, who is a contractor. Alice was cold and isolated and George made shoddy houses. But Alice had an epiphany one day while taking a walk and fell back in love with her husband. George responded and it turned around the way he did business.

The youngest Delevan brother, Robbie, was traveling in Mexico where he met and married Susan, a smart, competent woman. When Robbie came home to get a job in the family business, Susan worked it out with Ben that Robbie would be challenged and worked hard and that he wouldn’t become another Quinn.

And so the scene was set. Ben told Quinn about the buy-out offer and did so harshly, telling Quinn just how worthless he’d become. Quinn got drunk and started feeling guilty and bitter. He went to Bonny’s house and beat her up, then got arrested and thrown in jail. Ben bailed him out and took him home. In the morning when Quinn woke up, he remembered Bonny and thought he’d killed her. He committed suicide, leaving a note for Ben where to find Bonny’s body. Ben went to Bonny’s house and found her beaten up but alive. He paid for her to go back to her family.

In the end, Ben realizes the family needs his strength, and that he needs the purpose that the mill gives him. He turns down the offer.

In many of MacDonald’s books, there are characters who think like I do, which probably means that MacDonald thought a lot like I do, but without Christ. In this book, I felt like I could really understand the frustration of Alice, the determination to make something useful of life that Brock was feeling, and the search for satisfaction of Ben. The ending, finding strength in family, is the best possible solution, short of Christ, that can be found. There were several likeable members of the family that I could root for, and they came out OK.