Winterchill chronicles the hardships endured by the Clark family as they fight against the loss of their land and family. Spanning forty years, the saga of the Clark family is told through the separate voices of the family members: Jim Clark who pieced together the 640-acre plum orchard that proves to be both the family's curse and salvation; Jim's son who dies by his own hand; his grandsons, James and Elmo, torn apart by the shared love of one woman, and their wives, Betty and Greta, both extreme in their loyalty to their husbands yet very different in their own desires; and Gerald, abandoned by his mother and welcomed into the Clark family home. 
Held together by their love for the land as much as by their love for each other, the Clark family must endure tragedy before triumph, just as it takes nearly one thousands hours of freezing winter cold before the plum buds will blossom.