Possum Summer — Jen K. Blom

Possum Summer is an uplifting novel about a girl and her father whose fractious relationship is healed by the hard lessons they learn about love and letting go. Eleven-year-old P (short for Princess) longs for a pet, but her father insists that all animals on their Oklahoma farm earn their keep. While he's away on combat duty, P rescues an orphaned opossum that she names Ike. When her father is injured and her world falls down around her ears, P knows she must find it in herself to betray Ike's trust and force him to survive in the wild - no matter how much it kills her to do it.