Jewell and Gil are farmers. They seem to be working against the odds, producing no financial surplus. Gil has lost hope of ever becoming prosperous, but Jewell decides to fight for her family.

Karl Westover, an inexperienced farm boy, runs away after unintentionally killing a neighbor, whose family pursues him for vengeance. He meets Barbarosa, a gunman of near-mythical proportions, who is himself in danger from his father-in-law Don Braulio, a wealthy Mexican rancher. Don Braulio wants Barbarosa dead for marrying his daughter against the father's will. Barbarosa reluctantly takes the clumsy Karl on as a partner, as both of them look to survive the forces lining up against them.

A divorced mother of two boys is stuck working as a telephone operator in a small Texas town during World War II. Her friendship with a Navy sailor on shore leave causes gossip in town.

Two championship rodeo partners travel to New York to find their missing friend, Nacho Salazar who went missing there.

In early 20th-century Montana, Col. William Ludlow lives on a ranch in the wilderness with his sons, Alfred, Tristan, and Samuel. Eventually, the unconventional but close-knit family are bound by loyalty, tested by war, and torn apart by love, as told over the course of several decades in this epic saga.