John Bishop Manchester, a boy of sixteen, finds himself confronted with a rather adult situation at a very young and fragile point in his life. He has lived with his mother in the beautiful town of Norfolk, Virginia for the majority life and is unaware of his father's exsistance. When a pile of old secrets finds itself falling upon his mother's library floor, he flees in search of the man he would soon call his father. John finds himself in route along, with his mountain man of an uncle by the name of Frederick Manchester, to the Lexington, South Carolina tobacco plantation. Soon after his arrival, John realizes that the time to mature had come sooner than he had anticipated and finds himself in a very hostile situation. Life has finally reared its nasty head up at him and now he must take accountability for his mistakes and responsibility for the ones he holds dear. He soon finds himself traveling west in the company of a runaway slave by the name of James, two rambunctious irish brothers, and his faithful horse named Old Hickory. Not to mention a band of angry overseers who pursue their every move, led by a ruthless man by the name of Simon Monroe. In the American wild west, John will find that growing up will come natural when exposed to the unpredictability of this untamed land.