Young John Walter McElligott has no memories of his father, who was killed on Guadalcanal during World War II when John Walter was only two years old. But even though John Walter never knew him, he misses him as he grows up, lonesome and longing, in a small, rural Southern Illinois farm community. He and his mother, Lorene, now live with his Aunt Helen and Uncle Bob, or "Big" as he affectionately calls him, and their two daughters.

In John Walter's search to understand why he has been denied his father, he is inescapably drawn to the other men of the area who served in the war and returned, especially his older cousin, Sam, who was injured during the D-Day invasion and fought on through Europe until the end of the war. Out of their own respect for their fallen comrade, they all treat John Walter with a calculated deference and bring him into their world. They seem compelled to teach him their hard-earned lessons about life, responsibility, duty and honor. He nearly idolizes them, wants to follow in their footsteps, despite hearing their words of caution and witnessing the problems they have in dealing with their own war experiences and the civilian life that follows. But amid their own pain and confusion, John Walter still admires them as they work, drink, fight and die while they try to get along in a world to which they weren't prepared to return.