Upon completing the last lines of her autobiographical novel, youthful Katrin Hanson reminisces about her family life: In 1910, in a modest San Francisco house, Katrin's Norwegian-born mother, Marta Hanson, computes the weekly budget with help from her husband Lars, daughters Katrin, Christine and Dagmar and son Nels. When the adolescent Nels declares his desire to attend high school, Marta is pleased, but realizes their 'little bank' lacks sufficient funds to pay for his education. After each family member offers to make a monetary sacrifice so that Nels may continue his schooling, Trina, Marta's spinster sister, drops by to speak privately with Marta. To Marta's surprise, Trina announces that she is marrying Peter Thorkelson, a homely undertaker, and begs Marta to break the news to their sisters, Sigrid and Jenny, who Trina fears will laugh at her. As predicted, the bossy Jenny and whiny Sigrid laugh upon hearing of the engagement, but when Marta threatens to reveal embarrassing anecdotes about them to Trina, the sisters agree to keep quiet. Later that evening, Jonathan Hyde, the Hansons' erudite, penniless lodger, reads to them from Charles Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities , and the entire family, especially fledgling writer Katrin, is deeply moved by the story.
