Flannery recounts Smallboy's childhood at Lake Kesagami, her father's early death and the effect of this tragedy, her marriage to Simon Smallboy and move to French River, and her old age at Moose Factory. Through Smallboy's anecdotes and episodes in her life, long-vanished values and norms of Cree society are illustrated and recorded. A concise history of European contact with James Bay Cree by John Long and a summary of literature on the Cree of Moose Factory and James Bay by Laura Peers place Smallboy's life in historical context.