The first time I read this it was through Netgalley but I bought the Hardback a few years ago and did a re-read on audio so I could read the second book. I tweaked the old review just a little =)
*MAY CONTAIN A FEW SPOILERS*
I am not a big fan of the western genre, but when I read the blurb of this book about a girl going after a gang for killing her pa, I had to read it! There is nothing like a good ole vengeance tale!
The gang that beat and hung Kate's pa while she was out in the field is called The Rose Riders. They are a notorious gang that kills anything and anyone in their path.. they are thieves and low-life scum. They burn the house and that is how Kate realizes something is wrong and runs to see what has happened. As you can imagine she is shocked and devastated when she sees her pa hanging from a tree. She saves what she can from her house, buries her pa and sets out on her horse named Silver to KILL the people responsible.
Make no mistake.. Kate is 18... Kate is good with a gun... Kate isn't out for pleasantries in this world.. Kate is out to kill... those who killed her father will die, or she will die trying.
Kate's father leaves her a letter in a box that she salvaged from their home, in it he tells her if something ever happens to him to seek out a man named Abe in Wickenburg. At this point she knows something is wrong, that these men didn't just kill him for his land. She noticed a journal he kept was missing as well.
She manages to shoot and hurt one of the men on the road. She tracks him to a saloon and ends up taking him out while he is sitting in the outhouse trying to tend to his wound. She tries to get him to tell her who the gang is and where they are at... seems they don't care about leaving men here and there. She doesn't get too much out of him accept the satisfaction of shooting him in the head.
When she gets to Abe's home she finds out he was killed by a kick to the head from a horse a few months before, but the son's have a message to give her. There is another letter for her about what her father did when she was a young and about gold. Well isn't that just great! She is mad that he didn't tell her so she could have helped him keep watch in case anyone ever showed up looking for him.
She eats with the family and goes to head out when she is joined by Jesse and Will. Jesse says they are going the same way to do a cattle run to make money for the family. He also tells her they promised their father they would look out for her. Kate wants nothing to do with this and tries her best to talk them out of it. She just wants to get her job done. Well, you know how men are... they don't listen. So.. of goes Kate, Jesse, Will and Mutt, their dog. And FYI: they have no idea she is a girl, she has herself bound and dressed as a boy and calling herself Nate.
Along the way they make a deal with her to help with the Rose Riders if she lets them have the gold. She agrees as she cares nothing for the gold, she just wants those men DEAD!
Some things go a little crazy in another town after they meet up with the gang, some people die, things get burned down, and they pick up an Apache girl named Liluye that Kate saves. She's going to act as a guide to where they are going.
They are traveling to some mines where she knows that gang is heading. There is a lot of things that happen on their travels. More people die, revelations are found out and it's pretty sad, but the end game is a good one.
Happy Reading!
Mel ♥
GOODREADS REVIEW
**I would like to thank NETGALLEY and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Children's Book Group for giving me the opportunity to read the ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review.**
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