Jeannie Mcleod is angry and scared when separated from her mother for the first time in her life and placed with a foster family. She doesn’t understand why her mentally ill mother has been hospitalized and, no matter how kind her foster parents are, she wants no part of this new life. But working on a neighbour’s farm with a pair of enormous draft horses leads Jeannie to discover new things about herself, especially her empathy with animals. Faced at the end with the possibility of being reunited with her mother, Jeannie finds she’s gained not only a new sense of herself but a supportive family and community too.

Luanne Armstrong, author of three previous books for young readers and managing editor of Hodgepog Books, has used her own experience of working with horses on an organic farm as a young girl. Her depiction of farm life and her ability to involve readers in Jeannie’s growing love of animals is this novel’s strength.

But when it comes to the weighty theme of how a child deals with being placed in a foster family, Armstrong lets her readers down. She doesn’t fully explore Jeannie’s mixed emotions about her absent mother, emotions that include a childlike sense of failure to care for her mother. Understandably silently sullen at the beginning of the novel, Jeannie too quickly accepts all the perks of her new life. The rare moments of emotional conflict don’t ring true, and the novel’s too-tidy resolution is unlikely to satisfy young readers.