Early in the 19th Century, expanding markets for Pennsylvania's anthracite coal created a smaller scale prelude to the later California gold rush. It was an era as wild as any the West ever knew--yet it has been rarely depicted in history. A native of the Coal Region and avid student of its history, the author has attempted to provide an accurate sense of this particular time and place in a story probing the cost of unrestrained ambition.

Many of those who flocked to the region were ambitiously ruthless in pursuit of this "black gold." Captain Isaac Schlussel is typical of the breed,...

As John Donne said, and Hemingway repeated, "No man is an island." Sometimes it takes a crisis for people to accept that truth.

For the Keller family, the lesson evolves from a deer hunt which forces them to confront secrets that have separated them from one another and the truth for years. Why did Jake Keller rebel and decide he needed one last deer hunt?
Why had Andy, his son, suddenly quit hunting?
Who was responsible for the death of Andy's younger brother, Paul, and why had Paul broken the old man's rule against drinking on a hunt?
Why had Janet, Andy's wife, laughed...

Early in the 19th Century, expanding markets for Pennsylvania's anthracite coal created a smaller scale prelude to the later California gold rush. It was an era as wild as any the West ever knew--yet it has been rarely depicted in history. A native of the Coal Region and avid student of its history, the author has attempted to provide an accurate sense of this particular time and place in a story probing the cost of unrestrained ambition.

Many of those who flocked to the region were ambitiously ruthless in pursuit of this "black gold." Captain Isaac Schlussel is typical of the breed,...