A story of a pioneer woman in whose character the strengths and passions of America's early settlers are memorable rendered. Set in the Nebraska landscape in a community evocative of Cather's own (Red Cloud), My Antonia tells the story of Antonia Shimerda, a Bohemian immigrant, and Jim Burden, who like Cather was uprooted from Virginia to the Nebraska prairie. Antonia and Jim, like many of the other characters in this 1918 novel, are based on Cather's childhood friends.