Nakai is a bright, curious, and ambitious nine-year old girl who lives with her parents in Labadi, a small village in Ghana, West Africa. She has never owned a pair of real shoes beyond the makeshift ones her father crafts for her at the start of the school year. One day, while selling her mother's nut bread at the market to help support her family, she finds a surprising treasure that inspires a quest: a Sears catalog from the United States. She is absolutely mesmerized by the American fashions-especially a dazzling pair of red shoes. Excited and inspired, she races home to share her discovery. Undaunted by her parents, who sadly admit that they cannot afford to buy the shoes for her, Nakai becomes more determined than ever to solve her problem. She quickly decides to find a way to buy them for herself. With the help of her independent-minded pet goat, Bongo, she embarks on a series of adventures and plans-some more successful than others-to raise the money she needs to buy her very first pair of shoes.