Gray clouds hung low over the city after a brief morning shower and there was a chill in the air. Having just turned sixteen, Susan Farnsworth gathered her meager belongings then stepped out into a world that was unfamiliar to her. Standing in front of the orphanage, it frightened her to know that she could not simply turn around and go back inside, and for the first time she was all alone. With few options and little hope, she became a mail order bride with the help of a friend. After a year of writing back and forth to a man who lived in the Black Hills in the Dakota Territory, she agreed...

The late eighteen hundreds was a time of growth and expansion in this great country. The land was open and wild. Often the land was waiting for the strong to take it and make something of it. It took courage just to keep it once it was settled. Laws were often few and far between. The law was often what man made of it. It was also a time when the land grew. Towns sprouted up all over the country and the stagecoaches tied them together with ribbons of narrow, often dangerous, roads. Often men hunted men for the bounty on their heads, while some hunted others so that justice could be met. The...

Peter Blackstone, a Denver private Investigator, was returning from a date with his long time girlfriend when he turned a corner and almost ran into a large lawn bag. When he tired to remove the lawn bag from the street, it broke open. He discovered that the bag was filled with more than leaves. There was a body of a young woman in the bag. That was the beginning of his search for the murderer of Emily Sutherland, a student at the Denver School for Artists and a cocktail waitress at a local night club. His search for her killer led him into the world of prostitution, gambling and drugs. Peter...

There are many stories of the frontier, a time when this great country was having its own growing pains. In this book you will find a story of a man who is simply trying to survive from one day to the next against all odds. There are stories of outlaws and their attempts to take what they want and end up paying the price. There is a story of a man who stands by another person at the risk of his own life just to make that person's last days a little better. The Frontier is a collection of short stories about the struggles of some and the evil and others. There are stories of good triumphing...

The land west of the Mississippi was a wild and untamed land. It took lawmen, outlaws, farmers, storekeepers, soldiers, teachers, bar girls and strong willed women to tame this vast country. All kinds of people crossed the great Mississippi River to make their mark on the land and make it what it is today. The people who settled and brought law and order to the vast Untamed Land were the same people who made the legends of the old west. It's those legends that still inspire us to dream of those days gone by. Untamed Land is a collection of short stories about the strengths and weaknesses of...

Peter Blackstone is visited by the sexy young wife of a prominent Denver figure, Arnold Williams. Samantha wants to know why her husband goes out on Wednesday nights without her. Peter takes the job, but before he can follow Arnold, he is murdered. Samantha becomes the prime suspect and Peter shifts his focus to finding Arnold's killer. Arnold is the principal investor in a high rise building in Denver. A report that the building is unsafe causes an investigation. Peter discovers that local mobsters have been investing a lot of money in the building. They were likely to lose a great deal of...

Conflict in Elkhorn Valley is the story of one man's fight to keep the ranch he had worked hard to build in Elkhorn Valley in Montana. Sam Willard had spent years building up his ranch only to have a couple of his neighbors try to take it away from him. A long drought had been plaguing the entire valley and was causing the ranchers to become angry with their neighbors simply because one rancher had more water than another. some of the ranchers were even blaming other ranchers for their problems. Sam Willard, with the largest ranch in the valley, took the brunt of their anger. Sam was accused...

Nick McCord receives a disturbing call from his old friend, Tom Walker. Nick takes time off from his job as a Milwaukee policeman and goes to Gill's Point Lodge on the shore of Lake Michigan. Tom told him about a body found on the beach incased in ice, and that the body is that of Elizabeth Samuelson who disappeared a hundred years ago. He is also told of strange sounds and ghostly figures in the lodge. Finding the tale hard to believe, Nick agreed to look into it. Monica Barnhart, a history professor, who was there to research the history of the lodge provides Nick with its background. She...

Tales from the Territory are stories about what it took to tame the land that is now known as South Dakota. The Dakota Territory was formed on March 2, 1861 about six weeks before the Civil War began. It remained a territory until November 2, 1889 when it was split into North Dakota and South Dakota. The stories show the strength of its settlers and of those who chose to make a home there. There are stories of the men and women who did what was necessary to make it a safe place to raise a family. There are stories of those who came to the territory to seek their fortune, and of those who...