Includes bibliographical references.

"Set in 1903, Adamson's compelling debut tells the wintry tale of 19-year-old Mary Boulton -widowed by her own hand - and her frantic odyssey across Idaho and Montana. The details of Boulton's sad past—an unhappy marriage, a dead child, crippling depression—slowly emerge as she reluctantly ventures into the mountains, struggling to put distance between herself and her two vicious brothers-in-law, who track her like prey in retaliation for her killing of their kin. Boulton's journey and ultimate liberation—made all the more captivating by the delirium that runs in the recesses of her mind—speaks to the resilience of the female spirit in the early part of the last century"

Canada Reads, 2009 finalist