When her father's business closes because of the Great Depression forcing Kit to make changes in her life, the nine-year-old responds with resourcefulness.

Ruthie Smithens, a girl who loves fairy tales and happy endings, doesn't mind being "goofy Ruthie" if it makes her best friend Kit Kittredge, smile and forget about the hardships of the Depression. But when Ruthie finds out that the Kittredges are going to be evicted from their house, she makes up her mind to help. Ruthie knows that to bring about a happy ending, she'll have to be as smart and brave and determined as she can really, truly be.

In 1934 Kit finds that she has hard lessons to learn about the Depression both at home, where she is helping her mother run a boarding house while her father looks for a new job, and at school, where a fight spoils the preparations for the Thanksgiving pageant.

In 1932, Kit faces a very different Christmas because of her family's financial problems and allows her pride to estrange her from her best friend.

A modern-day girl finds herself in 1933 Cincinnati, Ohio, and as she and Kit experience life during the Great Depression, the reader is invited to choose how Kit might help her family and others who are less fortunate.