The author recounts her life growing up with her survivalist Mormon family in Idaho. She lacked any formal education, but began to educate herself and taught herself enough to be admitted to Brigham Young University and then Cambridge.

Choose the good -- The midwife -- Cream shoes -- Apache women -- Honest dirt -- Shield and buckler -- The Lord will provide -- Tiny harlots -- Perfect in his generations -- Shield of feathers -- Instinct -- Fish eyes -- Silence and the churches -- My feet no longer touch the earth -- No more a child -- Disloyal man, disobedient heaven -- To keep it holy -- Blood and feathers -- In the beginning -- Recitals of the fathers -- Skullcap -- What we whispered and what we screamed -- "I'm from Idaho" -- A knight, errant -- The work of sulphur -- Waiting for moving water -- If i were a woman -- Pygmalion -- Graduation -- The hand of the almighty -- Tragedy -- A brawling woman in a wide house -- Sorcery of physics -- The substance of things -- West of the sun -- Four long arms, whirling -- Gambling for redemption -- The family, morality, and social science -- The princess -- Educated.