Author: Alethea Williams
Genre: Western historical
Publication date: May 9, 2016
Blurb:
At the turn of a new century, changes unimagined are
about to unfold.
THE WOMAN: Kidnapped by the Apaches, a
Mexican woman learns the healing arts. Stolen by the Utes, she is sold and
traded until she ends up with the Piikáni. All she has left are her skills—and
her honor. What price will she pay to ensure a lasting place among the People?
THE MAN: Raised in a London charitable
school, a young man at the end of the third of a seven year term of indenture
to the Hudson’s Bay Company is sent to the Rocky Mountains to live among the
Piikáni for the winter to learn their language and to foster trade. He dreams
of his advancement in the company, but he doesn’t reckon the price for becoming
entangled in the passions of the Piikáni.
THE LAND: After centuries of conflict,
Náápiikoan traders approach the Piikáni, powerful members of the Blackfoot
Confederation. The Piikáni already have horses and weapons, but they are
promised they will become rich if they agree to trap beaver for Náápiikoan.
Will the People trade their beliefs for the White Man’s bargains?
Excerpt:
The fat man
stood swaying a short distance away, greasy hair hanging in tangles about his
face. Isobel, despite her own predicament, felt sorry for him. She didn’t know
if Áyílaa would permit her to talk to the stranger, so she tried to do so
before the Apache returned.
“You,” she
said, “¡español! Who are you, and how
do you come to be in the hands of the Apache?”
The fat man
tipped his head to listen. She could see surprise and confusion, with a hint of
distrust of her upper class accent, written on his puffy features. He said, “I
am Pedro Navarro.” He hesitated. “Who are you?”
“I am Isobel
Ochoa y Ramírez.” Her voice caught. “We—my father and I—were captured by the
Apache in the Cerro de los Manzanos.”
“Ochoa? Don
Armando Ochoa is your father? What happened to him?”
“He
lives...barely. He is strapped to a horse behind us. Do you know him?”
The fat man paused,
working his hands uselessly against the bonds on his wrists. Isobel studied
him. She decided she didn’t like this fat man; for some reason she didn’t trust
him. She needed someone to depend on. Like a heavy snake, Pedro Navarro
continued to wriggle out of a direct answer to her questions.
The Apache men
waiting for Áyílaa shot her warning looks, and so she fell silent. She glanced
again at her unconscious father. She had the eerie feeling that despite the
evidence to the contrary, he truly was dead. More and more, she feared it would
become her fate to cope, alone, with the Apache.
Áyílaa strode up and mounted the
stallion. They swiftly started off once again, Isobel running as fast as she
could and Pedro Navarro sometimes running and sometimes being dragged along
when he stumbled and fell. As they rode away from the spooky sandstone formations,
Isobel wondered dully if she would ever have a chance to escape.
Buy link:
Bio:
Alethea Williams is the author of Willow Vale,
the story of a Tyrolean immigrant’s journey to America after WWI. Willow
Vale won a 2012 Wyoming State Historical Society Publications Award.
In her second novel, Walls for the Wind, a group of New York City
immigrant orphans arrive in Hell on Wheels, Cheyenne, Wyoming. Walls
for the Wind is a WILLA Literary Award finalist, a gold Will Rogers
Medallion winner, and placed first at the Laramie Awards in the Prairie Fiction
category.
Find me:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/actuallyalethea
Website: http://aletheawilliams.weebly.com/
Thank you ever so much for hosting the pre-release of Naapiikoan Winter!
ReplyDelete