Brazil, 1940. Maria, a young outlaw, discovers she is pregnant; after her band is wiped out, she flees to the Center-West to give birth and start life anew. She joins Getúlio Vargas’s "March to the West" government program, which promised land to small farmers. In the first half of the story, Maria confronts untamed nature—discovering that farming is an art. In the second, her past comes back to haunt her, and she must summon her fiercest, most indomitable courage.