This is a sequel to 'Biting the Moon.' I found it forced, unbelievable, and poorly written. There are several cases of where Ms. Grimes gave details about something but never developed a story associated with the details. It is unbelievable that a girl can show up in a town with a donkey, steal pigs, carry a gun, and no one question her. In fact, she gets TWO jobs for which isn't qualified for. P-l-e-a-s-e! The ending left it open for another sequel. If Ms. Grimes revives Andi again - I hope she writes a more plausible story.

I've always thought that her name showed a good part of what her stories revealed--the grim of life. This one is particularly grim as it depicts a particular part of raising meat food that we don't need to be reminded of too much. I encourage my friends Linda and Stephanie to stay very clear of this story. It is exquisitely well written, but it leaves an awful taste in the mouth about our food sources.

Excellent, truly excellent.

I love the Richard Jury novels, set in England and named after local pubs, but the books set in the United States, not so much. I now know 100% more than I need to know about factory pig farming and the horrible way that pigs are slaughtered. In fact, I became so upset that I went into the kitchen and fixed a BLT.

I've always loved Martha Grimes as a mystery writer, but Dakota is a wonderful departure from that genre. The story of a young girl with no memory of her past who finds her calling in the caring of and saving animals.

True, the Andi Oliver series is different from Ms. Grimes' other work. But that is kind of the point. Yes, the books end in an open-ended way, but that is also the point. Andi is an amnesiac; her very life is an open-ended mystery.

All of that, to me, shows Ms. Grimes ability to write other complex characters. I appreciate and admire that. And I enjoy the Andi Oliver books, if only because I learn a different point of view: Andi's often judgmental viewpoint is educational in many ways. She is a deeply caring individual, and she focuses that caring on the voiceless victims of our society, the animals. I have never been a fan of factory farms, but I also never looked into the details. I have never been a fan of environmental protesters, either, but can kind of see the point now.

I enjoyed the book, and the previous one, "Biting the Moon," if only because it is so different than what I normally gravitate to. One learns to care about Andi, and one finds oneself looking closer at the choices one makes in life.

I rarely start a book and don't finish it but I had no time for this story which seemed like something a romantic 14 year old would come up with. A beautiful young woman with 'amnesia' is walking from Santa Fe to Alaska, somehow she'd gotten as far as Idaho apparently but is now back in the desert southwest and stumbles upon a donkey that's being abused so she steals it, healing it with the herbal remedies she's used in the past to help coyotes and wolves(!). Of course the donkey is owned by an arrogant man that everyone in town hates so the people she meets cover for her, feed & house her and get her work. The clichés kept piling up so I quit.

1.5 stars, not recommended

Too much like Hotel Paradise--you got your chatty crowd at the diner, you got your wonderfully kind sheriff, you got your dreamlike quality to the narration, you got your annoying cab driver (who takes cabs anyway? what is it with Martha Grimes and taxis?), you got your surrogate parent figures for the innocent but wise young heroine, you got the mystery novel that never even lets you know what the mystery is, much less the solution...Which works in Hotel Paradise and the followups, set somewhere in the past, somewhere in New England, but doesn't quite work in modern day North Dakota.

The characters are bizarrely black and white. Grimes is too good of a writer to be doing this through ineptitude, so there must be a reason why people are either instantly kindred spirits with Andi (including the hit man originally hired to kill her) or instantly want to rape and torture her. And yes, the vivid descriptions of the pig farm and slaughterhouse let you know what the overriding purpose of the book is. Unsettling, at the very least. But all the same, it is Martha Grimes, and I do find myself rooting for Andi, and wanting to know what happens and what happened to her.

Martha Grimes creates a strange world full of men, mostly lone men, who ignore all women except for this one 20-year-old. The improbable story line, including amnesia and the delight of every single man who meets her, is only exceeded by the lackluster non-ending. This is the second Martha Grimes I have tried, and I finished this one. I won't be doing anymore..

I bought this because of the western North Dakota setting, but I had to stop reading midway as the descriptions of animal abuse were too graphic for me.