In her imagination, chubby nine-year-old Marsha is a champion figure skater, flying effortlessly across the ice. She hopes desperately for a pair of shining white skates on Christmas morning, so she can begin to make her dream come true. But when she opens the promising-looking red box, she finds only her Uncle Richard's ugly old hockey skates. Disappointed and disheartened, Marsha wonders if her dreams will ever take flight.

From the back of the Alfred A. Knopf reprint