There is a great deal to love in this book. There is wisdom, there is compassion, there is (particularly for its time) a considerable broadening of the scope of what a story of this type can be. Overall I am very fond of it. There are mainly two things that hold it back from being a five star read for me. The first is harm to a companion animal. The second is the fact that the writing style partakes of the heroic legend form of story telling, which is far from my favorite style. Still, unquestionably a novel that I would recommend.