Hearts Afire: At All Hazards

When Eliza and Billy Foreman are called on a mission to settle the San Juan country of southeastern Utah Territory, Eliza doesn't know what to do. A native of London, England, she considers herself a lady, much too fine to be pioneering in a howling wilderness inhabited by outlaws, Texicans, and two separate tribes of warlike Indians. To make matters worse, her later-in-life marriage to Billy has proven a terrible embarrassment, and it seems doomed to failure.

Although a goodhearted soul, the timid Billy has spent his life as a backroom clerk and has no notion of how to hitch a team, ride a horse, or even milk a cow. How, she reasons, can he possible move them and their belongings to the new community they've been called to help establish, especially since a good portion of their route has been unexplored, will cross the 2,000 foot deep Colorado river gorge through a narrow crevice that will soon be called Hole-in-the-Rock, and will then continue over perhaps the most desolate and difficult terrain for a wagon road in all of North America?

Meanwhile, on the San Juan, how will cattle ranchers such as Joshua "Spud" Hudson or I.W. Lacy react to this group who is coming to settle "their" range? Or outlaws, who crave this lawless region and are determined to take advantage of anyone who comes near? And what of the original settlers, the Navajos and Pahutes, whose cultures and territories are firmly established and who have already had too many negative experiences with white intruders?

In book one of the series Hearts Afire, master storyteller Blaine M. Yorgason spins an endearing historical tale about the coming together in the wild San Juan country of all these people-a tale of adventure, of danger and intrigue, and, most especially, of love.