Didier Rain is a scoundrel with the heart of an angel. Or maybe it's the other way around. In this wild, up-down sideways world of the American Frontier, a man can be hard pressed to know the difference between good and bad, catharsis and debauchery, or even God and the Devil. Rain will have to sort it all out on the run as he is charged with delivering an infant bride - said Virtue - to the Prophet Nehi at his mission in the City of Rocks. Winter is coming and hooligans, savages, and wildfire all stand in his way. Rain likens the task to carrying a glass of pure water over rough ground - "The chances are great that spillage will occur." It's also a fair chance for heroism. "For what man does not secretly feel he is destined for greatness if only greatness will take the bother to seek him out?" At the end of his often poignant, ever comedic gallop through the West's perils and epiphanies, Didier Rain will know once and for all if he's the gentleman poet he's always longed to be or just another fallen angel.

A tale of allegory and archetype, this tour-de-force novel is an irreverent account of one man's attempt to corral his miscreant tendencies and fulfill his fated role in a miracle.