The narrator, a woman spending her summers in the fictional seaport fishing village of Dunnet, Maine, describes the people of the area and their life stories and retells anecdotes related to her by her landlady. Tales of hardship, adventure, unrequited love, isolation, self-denial, marriage and death are woven into a rich tapestry of rural life. Considered Jewett s masterpiece and an outstanding example of the local color writing in American literature.
