Retta Barre's not the first 12-year-old girl to travel the Oregon Trail. And she won't be the last. But for something that's supposed to be the grandest adventure of her life, the long, slow days sure are dull. Thick dust, irritating bugs, and picking up buffalo chips are not the stuff of the action-packed penny novels she loves to read. When things change in Retta's life, they change fast. A simple trip into the prairie brings both adventure and big time trouble. Soon Retta is the talk of...

Tap Andrews knows that to stay alive in the Old West he needs three things: a fast horse, a quick hand, and enough smarts to know when to get out of town! Pepper Paige is sick and tired of fighting and emptiness that surround her as a dance-hall girl. And tired of fearing Jordan Beckett, a violent patron who has turned his attentions on her. Pepper gets her chance to escape when an injured woman in a stagecoach wreck dies in her room. The stranger, a refined and educated Christian, informs...

Nathan T. Riggins panicked as he hurried from one empty building to the next. Where was everyone? How could everybody in a whole town just disappear?In the deserted Post Office, bags of unopened mail lay everywhere. With increasing dread, he looked through the stacks of letters. There it was--his own letter to his parents telling them he was coming. No wonder they hadn't waited for him here in Willow Creek. Now what should he do?Nathan set out across the Nevada desert in sear...

The Joyton family runs a station for the famed Butterfield Stage Line on a mountain pass in southern Arizona Territory. It is a pleasant, solitary life until a stagecoach arrives with a dead man inside. They are told the mysterious man accidentally shot himself. But 14-year-old Drew Joyton suspects foul play. A new family arrives and begins to build a store, even though there is no town nearby. Meanwhile, a dangerous stranger appears. Then hostile Apaches pin down two wagon drivers headed ...

For a man who didn't need another disaster, the fierce winter at Broken Arrow Crossing couldn't have come at a worse time. Stuart Brannon abandoned his Arizona ranch, sick with grief after losing his wife and baby son in childbirth, as well as his cattle to disease. That's when the vicious Colorado blizzard struck. Half frozen, Brannon stumbles into the isolated stage station at the Crossing. He finds a wounded prospector and attempts to nurse the man back to health. Winter storms bring ot...

New York editor Lynda Dawn Austin expected to find a manuscript that would rock the publishing and boost her career. But the real surprise was the cowboy guiding her through canyon country to find it. When he first walks into the plush New York offices of Atlantic-Hampton Publishing Company, no one takes the eccentric stranger seriously. At least, not until he mentions the manuscript. He claims he possesses the long-lost third novel of Martin Taylor Harrison, their most successful author. ...

In a town full of folks seeking to get rich quick, the Skinner family has already found their real treasure. Alkali dust blows on 100-degree days. Saloons line every block. A gold rush puts gamblers and gunfighters, prospectors and promoters on every corner. It is Goldfield, Nevada, June 1905. No place for a family to settle. O.T. Skinner and his family have no intention of staying more than a day or two. Long enough to replenish their supplies before continuing the journey west. But next ...

Are you a spiritual seeker? Got a passion to know what following Jesus means? Jesus had no fear of excellence. He did all things well. You can too. Start by learning the basics to being a way-paver. Join this select society of disciples, like John the Baptist did. Learn John's four secrets to spiritual success. Consider the common obstacles to overcome. Review the fine print cause. The come alongside another's ministry. Focus the honor where it belongs. Dig deeper into Mark 1 and Mark 7 wi...

Cody, Feather, Jeremiah, and Larry have other reasons for calling their 3-on-3 summer basketball league team "The Lewis and Clark Squad." But considering the crazy situations they get into, they might as well have named themselves after the famous adventurers from their history books. In their first adventure, mysterious weird objects keep appearing in an abandoned out-of-state pickup on a neighbor's property. Yet the kids never see anyone around it. It makes no sense until they find their...

In 1870 a fugitive from Yankee justice, Confederate veteran Sandy Thompson looks for peace and solitude in the expanses of the untamed West. His quest is complicated by his reluctant business partnership with a low-down peddler named Montana Mudd and an orphaned Indian girl entrusted to his care. Somehow, together, the three drifters must find a home in a land where thieves, vengeful enemies, and forces of nature constantly threaten. And the trio must finally come to grips with the siniste...

For only a dollar, Thunder was a terrific bargain. But what can a boy do with a dangerous 2,500-pound buffalo that can break out of any corral ever built?Nathan Riggins must find some way to keep Thunder from killing someone or being killed. He finally decides to donate his buffalo to the Carson City Zoo. But getting him to the zoo will be a problem. Thunder has already destroyed one rail car and damaged the train's engine. The railroad refuses to ship him again. The answer comes in...

The secret lay dormant for over half a century, forgotten and covered over by years of quiet activity in the sleepy community of Fox Island, Washington. Now that Tony and Price Shadowbrook uncovered the truth, what should they do? Say nothing and allow the lie to live on? Or speak up and risk destroying the lives of many innocent people? Fox Island is the first in a series of cozy mysteries set in little known locations in the western U.S. The series follows the summer expeditions of weste...