Jerusha Abbott is the “Oldest Orphan in the John Grier Home” until, one day, a mysterious benefactor decides to send her to college to be educated as a writer. Required to write him a letter once a month (to practice her literary skills), she is never to know the benefactor’s identity—so she invents one for him: Daddy Long Legs. Although she knows he will never respond to her letters, she grows more and more fond of this elusive and kindly “old” gentleman and begins to think of him as the grandfather she never had. But soon another relationship begins to develop in Jerusha’s life.

Jervis Pendleton is the well-to-do “youngish” uncle of one of Jerusha’s roommates who introduces her to a world of literature, travel and adventure. Through her correspondence with Daddy Long Legs and her growing intimacy with Jervis, Jerusha’s letters chronicle her emergence as a delightfully independent “New American Woman.” Yet there is one startling fact that Jerusha has yet to uncover—a fact that will change her life forever.