Samuel Gentle, the groundskeeper for The Church of the Holy Comforter, has heard God's call three times. The first was in a field off the Pamet Roads in Truro while accompanying his father on a walk; the second was in the aftermath of a terrible bus accident with his friend Inez Castill while he was minister of a small adobe church about forty miles outside of Albuquerque at the foot of the Cebolleta; and the third was the birth of his daughter, Ariel, covered all over in a white-gold swirl of hair. Samuel has heard this voice but struggles to comprehend its mystery and his own rage and bewilderment at loss. He wants to believe that "grace enters the soul through a wound." As Ariel grows into a child of transcendent inner beauty and strength, Samuel regains his own faith and discovers what is most holy.