In the summer of 2020, Kate Corcoran is a retired journalist and in quarantine due to the COVID-19 pandemic. There are hopes of reopening during the summer, the Tokyo Olympics rescheduled for 2021, and Black Lives Matter protests in cities around the country.

While in quarantine, Kate begins writing a novel. She sees the old copy of To Kill a Mockingbird and recalls the summer of 1964. She decides to do what she should have done earlier: Search for America and start a novel that tells their story. She types America’s name into an internet search but there are no results. She resolves to make deeper search but hesitates, knowing that she cannot meet up with America because of the pandemic. She still has America’s old letter and decides to write one of her own.

In the letter, Kate catches America up on her family’s story after America’s departure from High Cotton. Kate’s parents have passed and Mack, who could not be drafted into the American War in Vietnam because of his injury, reunited with his first love, Lorelei, received a history degree, and coached the school’s baseball team. Lorelei became a lawyer. Cal made Belle a partner at the drugstore.