After the death of his employer forces him out of the only home he's ever known, a simpleminded, sheltered gardener becomes an unlikely trusted advisor to a powerful tycoon and an insider in Washington politics.
An uncompromising, visionary architect struggles to maintain his integrity and individualism despite personal, professional and economic pressures to conform to popular standards.
Idle intellectuals Albrecht, Octavia and Äls, are given to quoting and emulating their philosopher hero, Nietzsche. Albrecht later contracts typhus bringing the foster child gravely ill Äls out of an infected area.
During the early part of his reign, Ivan the Terrible faces betrayal from the aristocracy and even his closest friends as he seeks to unite the Russian people.