This book is about a young child named Julie who grows from 7 to 17 years old with her aunt Cordelia and uncle Haskell in the country.

At first, grief-stricken Julie finds Aunt Cordelia stern and strict, but as she grows to young adulthood she comes to love her and to see her house as home.

The story follows Julie from the age of seven to seventeen, from elementary school through her high-school graduation, and documents the ordinary events in a child's life: the cruelty of children, jealousy, schoolwork trouble, and first love.

Julie also encounters problems in the lives of the adults around her, including alcoholism and mental illness (dementia).

"[1] In a retrospective essay about the Newbery Medal-winning books from 1966 to 1975, children's author John Rowe Townsend wrote, "Though not without faults, Julie seems at last just a little too good to be true, and so does the adult world in which she has won her place.