Farmers don't believe in luck. ".

. .

beyond Bozeman with four hundred dollars, a couple of fishing poles, and a suitcase stuffed with year-old work clothes, he was driving his car along the straight, flat highway stretching west from Spokane. It was about noon when he first saw Gainesville .

. .

" Independence, for Sam Lawrence, has always meant the ability to cut ties and move whenever he feels he wants to. Suddenly though, faced with the feeling he might want to actually set down roots within the rolling hills of the Palouse Country in Eastern Washington, he finds himself being strangely kept on the outside.

Only with time does he realize he's accidentally found himself entangled in a power struggle between two brothers. And realizes as well that his only hope, if he wants to keep what he has found, is to choose to befriend the brother he likes the least.

And while that difficult solution seems clear, he is to discover there is another, that he never would have expected. An absorbingly introspective study of human nature set against an inspiringly idyllic backdrop.

-- Kirkus Reviews. .