For most of the way through this book I was giving it a 2 out of 5 but the last third kicked the score up for me. I found it fairly depressing I have to admit and if you like a happy ending then you probably shouldn't read this. My favourite thing about this novel was the central character of Duchess, a young teen girl, who is just all kinds of awesome. There are so few male authors who can write a convincing female character, in my experience, but to not only do that but to write a teenage girl so convincingly I wouldn't have known the author was a man, takes some serious skill.

Also the parts set in Montana were so evocative of the landscape. I have been watching Yukon Vet and I know it's a different area but I feel like the countryside would look the same so that's what I pictured.

The story just made me sad.