As Stef Penney suffered from agoraphobia[2] at the time of writing this novel, she did all the research in the libraries of London and never visited Canada.

In an Elle Q&A interview, Penney revealed that the inspiration for the novel originated as a screenplay she had written 12 years prior to the novel, which also featured the novel's main character, Mrs.

Structurally, The Tenderness of Wolves is divided into four parts: “Disappearance”, “The Fields of Heaven”, “The Winter Partners”, and “The Sickness of Long Thinking”.

Mrs. Ross, the protagonist and first-person narrator of the novel, finds the mysterious trapper in his isolated cabin on the outskirts of settlement called Dove River.

News of Jammet's unfortunate end travels south as well, bringing it to the attention of Thomas Sturrock, a former journalist and retired searcher whose talents have endeared him to many Indian tribes.