Robert Greinier, a railroad worker in early 20th century America, falls in love with Gladys and isolates himself with her in an idyllic valley, where their daughter will be born.

A fire will deprive Greinier of this sliver of happiness in a lifetime of hard manual labor. By the end of his life, he will remain isolated in nature on the fringes of History, in an America that is radically transforming, as an entire era is lost forever.

In his masterful novella, Johnson, with a simple, sharp, and touching style, manages to condense the essence of an entire life of a man, which began with a train journey that he could not remember, and ended while he was sitting and waiting outside a train that contained Elvis Presley.