Jack Durkin is the ninth generation of Durkins who have weeded Lorne field for nearly three hundred years. Though he and his wife Lydia are miserable and would like nothing more than to leave, Jack must wait until his son has come of age to tend the field on his own. It's an important job, though no one else seems to realize it. For, if the field is left untended, a horrific monster called an Aukowie will grow--a monster capable of taking over the entirety of America in just two weeks. Or so it is said ...