1960s Korea. A girl stands in the middle of the sunny cabbage patch with her mother. The air is full of butterflies (the souls of little children in afternoon naps) and secrets (though they were not secrets at the time).

House of the Winds is a portrait of a family whose lives have been deeply affected by the tumultuous long years of Japanese rule and the Korean War. And it is the story of one mother and one daughter. Young Wife is a magic-wand mother who tells stories of the time when tigers smoked pipes. One day her white summer blouse runs deep red, mango-red and azalea pink. Who knows from where this sudden sadness sprouted?

Her youngest daughter is our guide through this world in which an American electric iron is so powerful it sets off a coup d'etat. The daughter begins to see "how Korean women, descendents of the she-bear woman and the son of the king of heaven, lived in the folds of history...laughing, wailing, spirit-cajoling, poetry-writing, tear-hiding, bosom-bracing, scheming, fire-breathing."