Left alone by her Indian tribe when they decide to sail to the east, Karana, a young Indian girl, lives on a beautiful but isolated island off the coast of California, where she spends eighteen years, surviving through her enormous courage and self-reliance. Year after year she waits for the ship to return but it never does. Finally she realizes she must make a fateful choice: follow her people on her own or remain alone fo rthe rest of her life....

Having run away with her younger brother to live in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, twelve-year-old Claudia strives to keep things in order in their new home and to become a changed person and a heroine to herself.