Orlando Sackett got to Texas with a damn good idea of the whereabouts of buried gold across the border in Mexico. In Mexico he had bad luck. His party had to run for it, and when Lando stood rear guard they pulled out and left him. Six years in a Mexican prison put muscles in his arms, fire in his heart and pure recklessness in his head. He survived by using his skills as a boxer and by making three vows. One was to find the men who betrayed him....

Victoria (Tory) Blaisdell longs to live a life as adventurous and independent as that of her heroine, Jane Eyre. When Tory's father loses his job and decides to seek a share of the newly discovered gold in California, Tory stows away on the westbound ship carrying her father and younger brother, Jacob. Though San Francisco is mud-caked, frenzied, and full of wild and dangerous men, Tory quickly finds friends and independence--until her father leaves...

When a drought tests the commitment of a mail-order bride from Maine to her new home on the prairie, her stepchildren hope they will be able to remain a family.

An abridged version of the story of young Caroline Quiner, who would grow up to become Laura Ingalls Wilder's mother, as she and her family have new adventures as the frontier outpost of Brookfield, Wisconsin, grows into a bustling town.

The Donner Party expedition is one of the most notorious stories in all of American history. It's also a fascinating snapshot of the westward expansion of the United States, and the families and individuals who sacrificed so much to build new lives in a largely unknown landscape. From the preparation for the journey to each disastrous leg of the trip, this book shows the specific bad decisions that led to the party's predicament in the Sierra Nevada...

When John Shefford rode into Utah's valley in search of a new life and met Fay Larkin, he knew he had found it. Even when she was charged with murder, he did not care. She was worth life itself. Breaking her out of jail was the easy part. After that he has posses to worry about, violent bands of Indians to out run, a murderous trek across a trackless waste, and a brutal passage through white water hell. Busting her out of jail had been a cinch. After...

A tough Minnesota winter brings many changes to Kirsten's frontier life, including the new responsibility of helping her brother Lars set his traps and a move into a new house for her family.

"Determined to recover his family's mules, fifteen-year-old Owen is joined by his kid brother and Telluride's notorious marshal in pursuit of a rustler--all the way to Butch Cassidy's hideout" -- Provided by publisher.

In late 1800s Minnesota, 13-year-old Ben Ward goes to work with his father in a lumber camp and signs up for a log drive with his friend Nevers, where together they endure freezing weather, dangerous rapids, logjams, storms, floods, and pioneer life in general.

In 1756, during the French and Indian War in upper New York state, ten-year-old Edward is determined to protect his home and family with the ancient, and much too heavy, Spanish gun that his father had given him before leaving home to fight the enemy.