This novel had a promising beginning. I was all in to learn more about Leni and her family as they make their way to the wilds of Alaska to start a new life. This first part reminded me of that TV series, The Last Alaskans. It's about people who live in a deserted part of Alaska and must completely live off the land. Leni and her family are actually is a small community, and some of these characters are fun to know about. And learning about all the work that they needed to accomplish before winter - stocking their food supply, gardening, fishing, chopping wood, etc. - was interesting to read about.
But then all hell breaks loose. The author perhaps had a list of all the things that can possibly go wrong in a family and then ticked them off one by one as she wrote about them: physical abuse, alcoholism, PTSD issues, extreme poverty, falling into a ravine, brain damage, murder, cancer, and the list goes on. I felt at times that I was reading a soap opera especially when I was reading the love scenes. Some of the violent parts of the story bothered me enough that I had to stop reading it at night before sleeping.
Perhaps a good editor could have helped if some of the plot lines could have been eliminated. Or maybe not. At any rate, I was disappointed in this one. -June
