The following version of this book was used to create the guide: Hunt, Laird. Zorrie. Bloomsbury Publishing Inc., 2021.

Laird Hunt's novel Zorrie is written from the third person point of view and in the past tense. The novel is primarily set in the farmland of Indiana, and spans several decades beginning in the 1920s. The following summary employs the same formal techniques used by the author.

Zorrie Underwood was an elderly woman living alone. After years of working the land on her own, she was discouraged when she realized her health was failing. She had even had to start taking regularly scheduled naps each day. Then one morning, Zorrie regarded her bed, and felt an overwhelming sense of longing.

When Zorrie was a young girl, both of her parents died of diphtheria. Afterwards, she went to live with her bitter and cruel old aunt. Although her home life was not always happy, Zorrie took pleasure in her studies. She was particularly fond of her schoolteacher, Mr. Thomas.

When Zorrie was 21, her aunt died of a stroke. She left nothing to her niece, not even the key to the home they shared. Destitute and alone, Zorrie left town in search of work. Along the way, she visited Mr. Thomas. He showed her artifacts from her schooldays, and they shared a pleasant afternoon together.

From there, Zorrie traveled from town to town taking odd jobs. Eventually, she ended up in Ottawa, Illinois. A few days after arriving, she found work at the Radium Dial Company. Here she met two other workers named Janie and Marie. The three young women established a close kinship while working together. Although Zorrie knew she would miss them, she felt desperate for home, and soon returned to Indiana.

In Forest, Indiana, she found a job splitting and stacking wood for an elderly couple, Gus and Bessie. Gus and Bessie loved Zorrie and introduced her to their son, Harold. Zorrie and Harold soon married, and Zorrie joined him on his farm in Hillisburg. She and Harold built a happy life together. They were even more content when they discovered that Zorrie was pregnant. In an attempt to stay healthy, Zorrie took regular doses of Luna powder, or radium, during her pregnancy. She soon had a miscarriage.

Over the course of three more years, Zorrie suffered another series of miscarriages. Not long later, Harold enlisted and ventured overseas with the United States Air Force. Less than a year after his departure, Harold was killed in combat.

To ward off grief and sorrow, Zorrie devoted herself to the farm and focused on forgetting Harold. With time, she realized that her voluntary forgetfulness had numbed her to life. She then began focusing on her memories, a practice which gradually began to unsettle her psychologically.

In the years following, Zorrie became increasingly attached to her neighbor and friend, Noah. She and Noah had known each other for some time, but Zorrie had begun to hope that something might happen between them. Noah's prolonged distress over his lover's institutionalization, however, kept him from entering a relationship with Zorrie.

In the final years of her life, Zorrie decided to travel overseas. She visited places in Europe where Harold had been. Her trip to the Anne Frank house particularly moved her. Once she returned home, she felt more reconciled with her life and death.