NOTE: This study guide refers to Etta and Otto and Russell and James, by Emma Hooper, the Kindle Edition, Copyright 2015.

In Etta and Otto and Russell and James, a novel by Emma Hooper, an 83-year-old woman named Etta leaves her farm home in Saskatchewan early one morning on a trek to see the ocean she has never viewed. Etta leaves a note for her husband, Otto, takes his gun, a few personal items, and some food. Along the way, Etta is joined by a talking coyote named James as well as other people who gain notice of her journey. Etta struggles with early stages of dementia. The lines between her identity and Otto's blend as the story extends. Otto enrages their close friend, Russell, when he declares that Etta should be allowed her independence. Russell chooses to go after Etta, whom he has loved since he met her sixty years ago. When he does catch up with Etta, she advises him to follow his own path and create his own journey which he does. Otto, on the other hand, stays at home, baking and making paper-mache animal figures while he waits for Etta's return. Flashbacks and letters of Otto's time in World War I play out on the current landscape of the aging trio's lives.