I received this book in the mail as part of an international book exchange. But the person who sent this is a friend and she picked this for me because the author lived in Colorado and the novel is set in the rural plains of Colorado. While this book has been around for awhile, it is a part of a series (according to Goodreads.com) and the most recent book was out in 2013. I had not heard of the author and so had no expectations. But I enjoyed this book immensely.

It is a fairly simple story that follows the lives of community members of Holt, Colorado–a fictional farm-town on the plains East of Denver. The characters are multi-generational. While the characters are not poor, they are also on the edge and a lost job or bad crop could spell disaster. But mostly, the stories seem to highlight how people in a community will care for one-another. I get the sense that we are losing true community as populations swell, people pay less attention to each other and rely on each other less. So this book is a nice reminder of what small town life looks like, or used to look like.

In the end, this novel is a beautifully woven tapestry of the muted colors of peoples’ lives that invariably intertwine. The kindness and humanity of the old bachelor farm brothers who take care of an abandoned teenage mother and the very young brothers who befriend an old lonesome woman seem to reflect each other. No matter the age or life story, kindness is kindness and love is love.