Joan Tower’s two big brothers didn’t want a baby sister. So they called her Jo and never admitted that she was a girl.

Even though the neighbors disapprove, Jo is happier doing boys’ jobs. A properly-brought-up young girl in a New England Puritan village of 1705 would never know all the useful skills, like fishing and swimming, that Jo learns from Dan and Sam. When it comes to doing ordinary household tasks, though, she believes she's hopeless. She’s not much good at cooking or knitting, and spinning thread is simply beyond her--a fact which her disapproving, fault-finding aunt and cousin never fail to point out.

But when Indians attack their little village of Hatfield and carry off many captives, including Jo’s mother, Jo and her brothers must make their way alone to Westfield to find shelter with their grandfather. In Westfield, however, more bad news awaits them, and Jo will find her own resources and courage sorely tested.