Ellie is stuck and following a series of events, her state of mind gradually becomes unstuck. She sees ghosts and has conversations with people who really should not be there, particularly two (dead) husbands, out of the four she has had. Children she thought she knew are growing up strange and too fast. Hearts and personalities seem to change, situations go from very predictable to anything but. It is the last season of the end of the millennium too, and the story is played out against Y2K fever and frenzy. Overlapping her story is the end-of-the-century events from 12-year-old Noel's perspective, who wants to be mature and finished and, like Ellie, often pretends to be. They both ached to break out of their small-town lives in the American Rust Belt. Television, magazines, pop culture, Rosie O'Donnell, and - most importantly - Oprah are what Noel cares about, and little Noel is a fixer. Ellie does not seem to care about anything anymore. Oprah launches one of her famous fan contests, this one for children. Noel decides to go on a quest to win the contest, meet Oprah, and fix everybody's lives, especially Ellie's, by New Year's Eve.