America. In the twilight of the Gold Rush, two siblings cross a landscape with a gun in their hands and the body of their father on their backs . .

Ba dies in the night, Ma is already gone. Lucy and Sam, twelve and eleven, are suddenly alone and on the run.

With their father's body on their backs, they roam an unforgiving landscape dotted with giant buffalo bones and tiger paw prints, searching for a place to give him a proper burial. How Much of These Hills is Gold is a sweeping adventure tale, an unforgettable sibling story and a remarkable novel about a family bound and divided by its memories. 'The 19th-century American West is the setting for C Pam Zhang's impressive debut.

Rickety wagons, gambling dens, dusty towns and dodgy outlaws stalk its pages . . .

How Much of These Hills is Gold breaks the mould [as a] revisionist immigrant fable of the making of the West . .