Thirteen-year-old Juniper is full of excitement when she's offered the chance to visit her aunt and uncle in Alaska and take part in a hunt in the Tongass National Forest. Juniper has plenty of experience hunting mule deer at home in Colorado, and she's sure she'll be ready for whatever Alaska can throw at her. But Southeast Alaska isn't quite what Juniper expected. When she expresses her disappointment out loud, she accidentally offends a local boy named Ben, who turns out to be part of the hunting expedition. Circumstances—including bad weather, elusive deer, and a surprise bear encounter—throw Juniper and Ben together on the hunt. They'll have to learn to work together and respect each other's skills if Juniper wants to get her first Sitka black-tailed deer.