John August's well-ordered life turns topsy-turvy upon his return home from a summer of fighting tundra fires in Alaska. His girlfriend promptly dumps him, and the beloved 58-acre meadow near his home is threatened by the bulldozer blade. While ruminating on the wreckage of his life, John spots a pair of red-tailed hawks nesting in a tree in the middle of the meadow. His empathy for the nesting hawks motivates him to fight off the meadow's destruction by forming an alliance with a die-hard environmental activist, an ambitious real estate agent, and a street-savvy lawyer. Along the way, he falls in love again while enduring a reign of terror carried out by a psychopathic lawyer who happens to be his former girlfriend's new love interest.