When Esperanza and Mama are forced to flee to the bountiful region of Aguascalientes, Mexico, to a Mexican farm labor camp in California, they must adjust to a life without the fancy dresses and servants they were accustomed to on Rancho de las Rosas. Now they must confront the challenges of hard work, acceptance by their own people, and economic difficulties brought on by the Great Depression. When Mama falls ill and a strike for better working conditions...

Poor Duncan just wants to color. But when he opens his box of crayons, he finds only letters, all saying the same thing: his crayons have had enough! They quit! Beige Crayon is tired of playing second fiddle to Brown Crayon. Black wants to be used for more than just outlining. Blue needs a break from coloring all those bodies of water. And Orange and Yellow are no longer speaking -- each believes he is the true color of the sun. What can Duncan possibly...

In the California apple country, 900 migratory workers rise up "in dubious battle" against the landowners. The group takes on a life of its own, stronger than its individual members and more frightening. Led by the doomed Jim Nolan, the strike springs from his tragic idealism, from the "courage never to submit or yield."

Olivia Mott wonders what will become of her and Fred DeVault's growing affection for each other when Fred becomes the local delegate to the national convention of the American Railway Union representing delegates who have voted for a boycott of Pullman sleeping cars.

Single mother Julie needs reliable transit to get to work. When a national strike breaks out, her daily routine becomes a gauntlet in this kinetic thriller about the insecurity of modern life in a ruthless society.