21-year-old Jonas Boulware has come home to Copernicus, his small southern town, after serving as a medic in the Middle East, where he was severely wounded performing a heroic act. As his body heals, he keeps memories of the trauma at bay. He doesn't remember and doesn't intend to. He is home, trying to figure out who he has become and how he can deal with it. But trauma assails him in Copernicus, too: an abusive father and a mother who bears the burden of a long-ago family scandal. He renews friendships - a high school classmate, a physician/mentor, and the Black owner of a golf course. An instinctual caregiver, Jonas takes in (and falls in love with) a down-on-her-luck young folksinger, he tries to rescue a teenaged boy from his squalid, dangerous home life. But bits and pieces of his wartime trauma intrude in nightmares and flashbacks, until he admits that he suffers from PTSD and must come to grips with it to survive. With help from friends and an unorthodox counselor, he takes steps toward facing his past and moving into his profoundly altered present and future. In doing so, Jonas uncovers secrets from his past that cast new and hopeful light on his new normal.