Lara’s Gift

Set in Imperial Russia, full of color and authenticity, this is a powerful, moving and impeccably researched story of one girl's love for her dog. Marley and Me meets Dr Zhivago!

Fourteen-year-old Lara is being groomed in the family tradition to take over as Count Voronstov’s next kennel steward, breeding borzoi dogs worthy of the Tsar.

But then Lara’s baby brother is born and she finds herself supplanted as her father decides to make the boy the next kennel steward. Going against her father’s wishes and becoming increasingly sure of her special gift of understanding these incredible dogs, Lara risks everything when she reveals the truth about her visions. Now she must save Zar, her favorite borzoi and the one she raised from birth, from a hungry pack of wolves. Only then can she find her own, extraordinary destiny . . .

Rights details

USA/Canada: Knopf (Random House); Fall 2013

• Ages 8 - 12