Tyler is 11 years old when the novel opens. He is a white American boy raised in a small Vermont town. He attends Bridgeport Elementary School and will begin middle school next year. He does well in school and especially enjoys science, Spanish, and history. Tyler has an interest in astronomy and knows many constellations; he enjoys the pastime of viewing the sky with his telescope, a gift from his late grandfather.

Tyler lives with his parents, his brother Ben, and his sister Sara on the family’s dairy farm. They raise and milk dairy cows for profit, and grow grain and corn to feed the livestock through the year. Tyler loves the farm, is a member of 4-H, and raises calves to show at the annual fair. Tyler’s excessive worries about his parents’ potential plan to sell the farm and build a house on a plot next to his grandmother’s house cause his parents to send him to stay with Aunt Roxy and Uncle Tony in Boston for a month in summer 2005. Tyler misses the arrival of the Cruzes and is surprised when he returns to learn that his parents hired undocumented workers in an effort to save the farm.