Thirteen-year-old Ben works at Blackwater Logging Camp as cook's helper to his Pa. Long days of flipping pancakes and peeling potatoes with his ornery Pa make Ben long to be out in the woods with the lumberjacks. Felling logs, sawing trees, driving a team through the snowy woods . . . that's what Ben wants to be doing.

But the long cold winter in a camp filled with outlandish characters teaches Ben a lot about himself. Especially when an orphan boy called Nevers arrives in camp. When Nevers signs on to work with Pa, Ben makes a friend and a rival, too.