The story is set in 1888 in Iowa during a punishing, deep winter. Elias Thorne, a weary but resilient farmer, and his wife, Clara, are enduring a relentless deep freeze when the weather takes a sudden, terrifying turn. On a frigid morning, the temperature plummets to freezing. However, a break in the clouds unveils an intense, summer-like sun. Within hours, the temperature soars to an incomprehensible rise in the middle of January. This sudden, unnatural heat turns the massive snowpack into a catastrophic torrent of meltwater.

A boy must survive his first hunt and find his place among his tribe.

Finn, a man battling depression in a remote cabin, hears a bear cub crying in the winter woods and ventures out to rescue it. But when the ice beneath them shatters, he plunges into freezing waters, trapped between hallucination and reality. Just as he’s ready to surrender, the cub’s mother appears, saving him. Through this encounter, Finn discovers a flicker of hope he thought he’d lost.