Dr. Sue Ann Parish is hired as principal of the one-room school in Moose Springs, Alaska. With her teenage daughter she moves to a community of dog mushers, trappers, gold miners, writers, artists, shady characters running from the law, and rugged individualists in general, each one with a story, whether told or hidden.

With the challenges of living in a remote bush village come additional problems, including falling in love with the elusive artist Shade Dubois, who hides dangerous secrets of his own. Just as things become settled for the new principal and life seems to be all she could ever wish for, the village is torn apart by violence and death. Just who is Raven, and how can Sue Ann and her daughter survive the evil that stalks them?