A young woman in the Wild West wages her own personal war for freedom and a desperate attempt to stay close to the man she loves, Billy the Kid, in 1877.

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In this sequel to Bandita Bonita, Romancing Billy the Kid, the Lincoln County War is far from over and William H. Bonney is now the most wanted, notorious outlaw in the New Mexico Territory. Elucia Howard, now christened with the celebrated moniker, Lucy “Lucky Lu” Howard, has settled into her new role as the Kid’s notorious outlaw sweetheart. With Billy condemned to death as a murderer, Lucy stands by him in his fight to clear his name, and with the few remaining Regulators, they embark on a journey that places Billy deeper within the clutches of the crooked law they had tried to destroy. Includes Readers Guide.

Nicole Maddalo Dixon was born in Philadelphia and raised in Bucks County, Pennsylvania where she lives with her husband, Wallace. Her first book, Bandita Bonita, Romancing Billy the Kid, was also published by Sunstone Press.

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ISBN: 978-1-63293-133-7
218 pp.,$22.95

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ISBN: 978-1-61139-472-6
218 pp.,$4.99

"A deftly written, entertaining, and ultimately thought provoking read, 'Beyond His Mercy' is unreservedly recommended..." --The Midwest Book Review

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The American Civil War claimed and destroyed lives, stealing fathers and sons from those they loved. The horror caused many returning to cry out for death. They carried the festering scars of battle and were unable to overcome the torment of their souls. This is the story of Thomas Wilson, a soldier who returns home haunted by the destruction and devastation he both witnessed and caused. Although his regiment respects and reveres him as a sharpshooter, each man he has killed condemns him to a life of terrifying dreams and troubled days where forgiveness can never be obtained. Neither the love of his family nor the affection of a woman with sparkling dark eyes and soft black hair can chase his war demons away, for he is beyond mercy. Includes Readers Guide.

As a child Johnny Neil Smith often sat at his grandparents’ fireplace listening to stories of their parents’ struggles while pioneering south Mississippi in the eighteen hundreds. Now a retired educator with an ardent interest in early American history, Smith weaves the stories he heard as a child into all his novels. In Beyond His Mercy, he tells the story of his great-great grandfather, Lott Williams, who located the children of his murdered son-in-law and deceased daughter who lived in Cass County, Texas, and who then brought his grandchildren to live with him in Mississippi. In all of Smith’s writings, he captures the emotions behind the events that were passed down to him from his grandparents. His wife, Susan Cruce Smith, also a retired educator, takes his stories and brings them to life by adding spiritual meaning, literary style, and a woman’s perspective. They are also the authors of Beyond the Storm, and Johnny Neil is the author of Hillcountry Warriors and Unconquered, all from Sunstone Press.

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Hardcover:
6 X 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-232-7
280 pp.,$28.95

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6 X 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-187-0
280 pp.,$22.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-523-5
280 pp.,$4.99

The year was 1864. The freezing winds off Lake Michigan swept across the snow laden grounds and through the cracks of a building that held Southern prisoners in Camp Douglas, Illinois. Huddled with the other prisoners, John mulled over the reasons he had enlisted, even after his father had forbidden it. He knew the only real reason was to protect his best friend Frankie, who had enlisted first but never even bothered to show up at the station when the recruits left for war. Shivering, he wondered if he would ever see his family again or especially the girl he had loved since childhood. John realized that nothing but an act of God could deliver him from this hell on earth. Includes Readers Guide.

Johnny Neil Smith, a retired educator in Mississippi and Georgia, taught Mississippi, Georgia, American and World History. Smith has written three previous novels, Hillcountry Warriors which received praise from Publisher’s Weekly, Unconquered which was a finalist in the Georgia Writer Association’s Author of the Year, and Beyond His Mercy with Susan Cruce Smith. Four of his great grandfathers served in the Confederate Army, and he has long been fascinated with the Civil War. His knowledge of that war and Federal prison Camp Douglas in Chicago, Illinois has made Beyond the Storm true to the times. The main character, John Wilson, was named after his grandfather and many of the accounts of battle and prison life relate to his great grandfather, Joseph Williams, who lost an arm in the battle for Atlanta and was sent to Camp Douglas. Susan Cruce Smith, also a retired educator, has given the book a woman’s perspective and added many of the Biblical and scriptural insights.

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Softcover:
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ISBN: 978-1-63293-233-4
250 pp.,$22.95

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ISBN: 978-1-61139-560-0
250 pp.,$4.99

In this historical novel, Billy Old and Jeff Kidder were Arizona Rangers at the turn of the twentieth century and best friends. In 1908, while acting in the line of duty, Kidder was murdered by five crooked Mexican policemen. No charges were filed against his killers. They were quietly skirted away to various locations throughout the county of Sonora, Mexico, a vast, desolate area covering nearly twenty thousand square miles. In 1909, shady politics in the Territory of Arizona brought about the disbanding of the Rangers, leaving many to drift into obscurity and some into degradation. In that same year Billy Old vanished into Sonora to find and kill the men responsible for his friend’s death. He returned close to two years later with that deed accomplished.

During Billy’s search of hundreds of sleazy Sonora whorehouses and cantinas he experiences many exciting, humorous, and tragic encounters. There’s a bloody and deadly confrontation with four scalp hunters; a mystical meeting with an old, dying Hopi Indian; an attack by the legendary “Red Ghost” of the southwest; a sorrowful meeting with a past fellow Ranger; cannibal Indians from East Texas; renegade Apaches; flushing toilets; the wonders of ether; Dancing Devils—fifty-foot high swirling dust funnels that can blind an animal; and a whore named Abbie Crutchfield who proves vital to Billy’s quest. And then there’s his horse Orion and a mule named Captain, all a part of a critically changing time in the American Southwest.

Includes Historical Background and Readers Guide.

Geff Moyer is a published playwright and retired high school theater and creative writing instructor. His play scripts have been produced by hundreds of schools and theaters across the country, including Canada, Greece, Australia, and the United Kingdom. This is his first novel. He and his wife Cathy have three sons and two granddaughters and live in the Kansas City area.

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Hardcover:
6 X 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-601-1
270 pp.,$36.95

Softcover:
6 X 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-139-9
270 pp.,$24.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-476-4
270 pp.,$4.99

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Suspended high above the desert floor like a hanged man dangling at the end of a rope, Shot Harry is detonated at exactly 5:05 a.m. on May 19, 1953. The predawn tranquility is butchered with three times the atomic rage of Hiroshima and “Dirty Harry’s” iridescent pink cloud rains burning radioactive particles on southern Utah. This event, plus an ill-fated volcano prank that kills two men (a friend and a sheriff’s deputy) and leaves another critically injured will change the lives of J.T. Kunz and Mick Graff forever. J.T. and Mick are charged with manslaughter in the deputy’s death. J.T. is devastated. Manslaughter is a felony and if convicted, he would have no chance of fulfilling his deathbed promise to his mother, namely, going on a mission for the Mormon Church. Mick, however, is unaffected. Though a Mormon, he has little time for religion. Mick’s health soon begins to deteriorate and he is diagnosed with acute myeloblastic leukemia, ostensibly from the radiation fallout. Faced with the prospect of his own death, Mick turns to God. J.T., on the other hand, is now becoming more cynical and disillusioned by God’s apparent indifference to Mick’s plight. He is forced to re-evaluate his own life and try to reconcile Mick’s imminent death with his religion’s conventional explanation of life, death and the hereafter.

Warren Stucki is a native of southern Utah. As a young boy, he viewed the detonation of several atomic tests. Now, as a practicing physician, he has witnessed the havoc these tests have wrought on the citizens of southern Utah. Following graduation from the University of Utah Medical School, Dr. Stucki specialized in urology. At Dixie Regional Medical Center he has served as Chief of Surgery, Chief of Staff and member of the Hospital Governing Board. In addition to Boy’s Pond, Dr. Stucki is the author of Hunting for Hippocrates and Sagebrush Sedition. Three others, beginning with Hemorrhage, followed by Mountain Mayhem and The Death of Samantha Rose, are part of a “Dr. Cooper” series of novels. A fourth book, Town Bell, is a prequel to the highly popular Boy's Pond.

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Website: http://books.google.com/books?id=wqWFaqk5D9EC

Hardcover:
6 X 9
ISBN: 978-0-86534-328-3
236 pp.,$26.95

Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-0-86534-976-6
236 pp.,$22.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-240-1
236 pp.,$4.99

"A FLAT-OUR ROCKET RIDE..."

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They once had power--all four of them--and they enjoyed it. Now, in the heat of the Vietnam conflict, they're on the fringes of government, relegated to participating in a war game, trying out moves that mimic reality rather than making policy. Yet, they tell themselves, this game is important. It will help the government avoid a false step that could launch nuclear terror.

The crisis they must deal with is a Chinese Communist thrust into Thailand and a Soviet attempt to take over Iran. But the four players-a former assistant secretary of state and Strategic Air Command pilot, a former effete ambassador, a philandering law professor, and a corrupt former U.S. senator-desperately want this game to be real, and they play it as if it were.

Soon they're obsessed, as their wives begin to realize. Each move becomes a personal commitment, not just an exercise. Reality and game-playing blur. Before long, these four members of the State Department team are deep in conflict with a more aggressive team from the Defense Department. As they continue to explore their strategies, they reveal their deepest secrets and ambitions, and in the end they have to face the fact that they are real human beings--not just players in a game.

CRAIG EISENDRATH served as a U.S. Foreign Service Officer with the Department of State, working in the area of outer space and nuclear disarmament. With a Ph.D. from Harvard University, he became a college dean and then head of the state humanities council in Pennsylvania. Today, he is a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy, a Washington, D.C. think tank, and the author of several books on international affairs, including The Phantom Defense: America's Pursuit of the Star Wars Illusion. Eisendrath also writes plays, most recently The Angel of History, which tells the dramatic story of a resistance fighter against the Nazis and her heroic attempt to rescue a famous philosopher.

PRAISE FOR CRISIS GAME:

Steve Zettler, author of The Second Man and Double Identity says: "Crisis Game is a flat-out rocket ride; giving new and intensified meaning to both crisis and game. When does the crisis end and the game begin? More crucial, when does the game end and the crisis begin? Eisendrath's style is thoroughly engrossing. Characters seemingly leap from the pages, struggling to match wits and backbone with the best and the brightest; but unable, or more likely, unwilling to escape from either the game or the crisis they have created. How cold was the Cold War...? You're about to find out."

Cordelia Frances Biddle, author of Beneath the Wind reports: "Craig Eisendrath shows us insider Washington in a dangerously isolationist mode where global politics become 'games' enacted by players with nothing to lose. Reading Eisendrath's tale of the Cold War, one wonders what lessons--if any--our present leaders have learned."

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Website: http://books.google.com/books?id=4DvbwhKFltIC

Hardcover:
6 X 9
ISBN: 978-0-86534-332-0
192 pp.,$24.95

Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-0-86534-333-7
192 pp.,$16.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-966-0
192 pp.,$9.99

It is Easter in the mountain village of San Blas in the territory of New Mexico shortly after the Mexican War. The secret auto-flagellant society of Penitentes is conducting its annual faux crucifixion ceremony. Six armed men, “gringos,” invade the village and the religious ceremony. The Cristo and an old man are killed, a young girl is raped, and the faux Christ’s young wife is kidnapped and violated. Quasi-outcast Severino, brother of the dead Cristo, who returns from scouting for the U.S. Army, alone, chases the outlaws and deals out revenge one by one.

Richard M. Lienau, with a background in electronics and computer technology, holds more than twenty U.S. Patents. He has written several novels, including Night Run, The Maltho-Rose Plot, Holy Ghost, The Truchas Light, Legacy of The Light and Gavilan, the last four from Sunstone Press, along with a number of screen plays, short stories and articles. He lives in San Miguel County, New Mexico.

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Softcover:
6 X 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-177-8
120 pp.,$18.95

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ISBN: 978-1-61139-513-6
120 pp.,$4.99

Order from Sunstone: (505) 988-4418

Will Brown, a small town boy from West Virginia, an inexperienced youth who gets cold feet when he’s with his childhood sweetheart and cringes at confrontations with loud mouthed bullies, dreams of joining the Marines so he can become the man he longs to be. Sidesplitting antics include Will’s first experience in a rowdy Southern bar, training his uncooperative hound dog, a traumatic night at the dance, a wedding, recruitment and survival techniques as Will is molded into a Marine. Along with laughter, it’s a sober reminder of the horrifying price paid for war. While in the trenches of enemy territory, Will’s life is changed as he endures hardships far away from home and watches brave men give their lives to rescue others. Although a fictional tale, readers will find details about the Marine Corps’ strenuous and excellent training at Parris Island, Camp Lejeune and Camp Pendleton during the sixties, and the Marines’ incredible fortitude required throughout the War in Vietnam.

Herbert H. Roebuck had an outstanding career in the U.S. Marine Corps including service in Vietnam. He was born in 1928 in Tampa, Florida. His many experiences over the years inspired this book. He has received recognition for recruiting over 931 Marines. Herbert’s experiences in the Marine Corps and his creative ideas inspired Connie Bertelsen Young to write Esprit de Corps. Her first book, Signs of the Time was published in 2013. She has also written a humor column called “Valley Gal” for two San Joaquin Valley, California newspapers and many of her stories and articles have been published in various books and magazines.

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Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-094-1
140 pp.,$18.95

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ISBN: 978-1-61139-435-1
140 pp.,$4.99

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In the early 1500s, twenty-four year old Spanish Captain Luis Escudero is already a legend in Spain’s professional army, living and fighting in her battles, gambling his life on the slim chance that one day he’ll have enough money to travel to that strange new world Christopher Columbus discovered just twenty five years ago. There he will build a ranch, leave the army and live in peace. Destiny takes a hand and Luis’ gamble might just pay off if he can stay alive long enough. King Carlos offers him command of a top secret expedition with orders to explore Mexico’s Aztec empire and determine whether wild rumors of vast piles of gold and silver are true or just wild delusions of drunken sailors. Spain needs a quick infusion of gold to stave off a financial crisis. “No European has ever set foot in that barbaric empire and crawled back to civilization alive,” King Carlos tells Luis. “It’ll be an enormous challenge. You’ll be outnumbered thousands to one—but if you and your men somehow manage to survive, return and verify there is gold, I’ll dispatch Hernando Cortez and his conquistadors to seize it and ship it back to Spain!” Captain Luis Escudero and his battle hardened mercenaries, the first Europeans to enter Mexico, set sail for the Aztec empire and this strange, mysterious adventure begins. Will the Aztecs allow foreign invaders to peacefully explore their historic land? Not if the Aztec army commander has anything to say about it.

Robert L. Foster is a member of Western Writers of America and has written many western articles for national magazines. He is a retired college professor and also the author of The Mutilators from Sunstone Press.

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Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-081-1
254 pp.,$22.95

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ISBN: 978-1-61139-401-6
254 pp.,$4.99

A boy’s tutor retells his search for the boy for seven years after he is kidnapped by the Comanches in this historical novel set in the late 1700s.

Arsène, the young son of the governor of French Louisiana, disappears in a blizzard on a trading trip in Comanche territory in 1789. For seven years, Jean-Pierre, the boy’s tutor and guardian at the time of his disappearance, searches for him on trading trips into comanchería. At last he finds him, only to discover that he has become a Comanche warrior now known as Amabate (The One Without A Head). Amabate returns to Fort St. Jean Baptiste de Natchitoches, Louisiana Territory, for a reunion with his father, but cannot be convinced to stay. “I am Comanche!” he exclaims.

Over the years, Amabate makes unannounced visits to his father’s home, sometimes with Comanche friends and relations, always painted and dressed as a warrior. Meanwhile, Amabate has joined a small band of “wolves,” braves who pledge never to back away from a battle as they roam the plains and ranges west into the mountains of New Mexico. Later he takes three wives and eventually he becomes White-Bear, a respected Comanche chieftain.

As an elderly man, Jean-Pierre tells the story of Arsène and his two worlds in a colorful combination of French, Comanche, Spanish, and English. He reflects on the verities of human relationships, his love for Arsène and for Arsène’s father, for the Comanche girl who was for a time Jean-Pierre’s wife, for his French wife, and for his Comanche “brothers.” Set in an authentic historical framework, the narrative explores the mores of two distinct cultures between the 1780s and the 1820s. We learn about the commerce of their days: stolen and traded ponies, war parties, battles with the Osage, love trysts, acts of bravery and revenge, prescient leaders, and prophetic dreams. The French Comanche is grounded in the dramatic sweep of history. The traders’ lives are affected by the French and Indian Wars, the American and French revolutions, Napoleon Bonaparte’s annexation of La Louisiane, and the Louisiana Purchase by the United States. The Comanches, ranging outside of “civilization,” are vulnerable to weather, illness, trade, enemy raids, and, as White-Bear foretells toward the end, the influx of American settlers.

Stanley T. Noyes grew up in California and was a writer, educator, and art’s administrator. During World War II, he served in the U.S. Army in the Ruhr campaign in a reconnaissance troop. They crossed the Rhine ahead of U.S. forces and later liberated slave labor camps. He was awarded the Bronze Star. When he returned he attended the University of California, Berkeley where he met and married fellow student Nancy Black in 1949 and earned his B.A. and M.A. degrees. For sport he rode bareback horses and bulls in rodeos in California and Nevada. Later Stan taught college at Cal extension and California College of the Arts. He lived in France with his family for about six years.

They moved to Santa Fe in 1964 and he taught at the College of Santa Fe, and briefly at the University of New Mexico. He later was a program director for the New Mexico Arts Division. Stan was a published author of poetry, fiction, and non-fiction, notably Los Comanches, The Horse People, 1751–1845, a history of the Comanche Indians now from Sunstone Press in a new edition. Noyes was an avid hiker in the mountains of New Mexico often accompanied by his wolf hybrids. He spent many summers hiking the Pyrenees with his family and close French and Spanish friends.

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Hardcover:
7 x 10
ISBN: 978-1-63293-506-9
298 pp.,$42.95

Softcover:
7 x 10
ISBN: 978-1-63293-257-0
298 pp.,$28.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-572-3
298 pp.,$4.99

“O’Shea and Shurgot illuminate their story with wonderful details of life on the frontier. [T]he characters are well drawn and embellished with significant backstory.... For those looking for a quick read about violence and injustice in the Old West.” —Kirkus Review

Jeremiah Staggart, a Confederate soldier, discovers while on leave in 1863 that Union soldiers have murdered his family and burned his farm in Tennessee. Because he could not save his family, Staggart succumbs to a paralyzing guilt that leads him to the edge of madness. After the horrific battles of Chickamauga and Chattanooga he deserts and, after working in Omaha for three years, arrives in Green River, Wyoming in August, 1866. There he meets Sheriff James Talbot, another Civil War veteran, who is trying to maintain peace between cattle baron Brent Tompkin and a band of Southern Cheyenne led by Chief Running Bear. Like many Cheyenne chiefs, Running Bear was infuriated by the terrible slaughter of Indians at Sand Creek, Colorado in 1864, and he has moved his tribe to the canyons northeast of Green River.

Sheriff Talbot employs Johnny Redfeather, of mixed Irish and Cheyenne heritage and also a Civil War veteran, in his efforts to maintain peace in and around Green River. When Jeremiah goes to work for Tompkin’s cattle business, he becomes deeply involved in the ensuing conflict. In his deepening delusion and search for redemption, Jeremiah, believing he is following his Biblical namesake, becomes obsessed with saving an Indian woman and her child whom he comes to believe are his lost wife and child. In the final battle at Greens Canyon the fate of Running Bear’s tribe, Johnny Redfeather, and Jeremiah’s frantic search for redemption and his lost family collide. Includes Readers Guide.

Michael W. Shurgot, PhD, retired as Professor of Humanities from South Puget Sound Community College in Olympia, Washington in 2006. His publications include three books on Shakespeare, numerous scholarly and pedagogical essays on Shakespeare and modern fiction, nearly fifty theatre reviews, a memoir and six essays on baseball. He and his wife Gail live in Seattle where he still teaches part-time.

Rick O’ Shea received an Associate of Arts in Humanities from South Puget Sound Community College and a Bachelor of Arts in Literature from St. Martin’s University in Olympia, Washington. He completed additional graduate writing classes in Los Angeles. Rick is an accomplished blues guitarist and he and his wife Serafina live in Encino, California, where he writes fiction and music.

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Hardcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-412-3
176 pp.,$32.95

Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-292-1
176 pp.,$18.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-586-0
178 pp.,$3.99

“There’s a little of the Appo Kid in all of us.”

When Air Force Captain Norm Whitman gets his orders to a remote island off the southern coast of Korea he finds himself working for Major Dubbs, who already hates his guts. But it only takes a day for Whitman to team up with his fellow site mates: An alcoholic chaplain (Father Paul); the irreverent site medic (Sergeant Goldman); a fellow captain (Andy Packer, nickname “Oyster”), made constantly miserable by his Korean “Yobo” girl friend (Adja); and a group of Korean officers dedicated to both their military mission and serious partying. The creed for survival: “It’s your mind or your liver!” Curiously flawed and alcoholic, Whitman carries his Catholic guilt from brothels to brawls. A group of Irish priest missionaries and other assorted characters who fly in and out from bases all over East Asia join in the rice-wine driven mayhem that drives base commander Dubbs up the wall. The good times end when Whitman must deal with the murder of one of his closest site mates, the Korean police, and his own shock at how suddenly life can turn ugly. On the heels of tragedy, Whitman is selected for an assignment just as surreal: Train and accompany his Korean counterparts for a top-secret mission to Vietnam. What happens in the war zone will prove to be his day of reckoning.

William J. Wallisch is a retired professor of English who’s been a life-long collector of military character sketches and tall tales. He’s filled many notebooks with “war stories” penned during his own twenty-three years of active duty service. Typical of his essays on military heroism is “In the Belly of the Whale,” published in War, Literature, and the Arts. His University of Southern California doctoral dissertation was a study of “The Integration of Women into the United States Air Force Academy.” This first novel was originally a collection of short stories, taken from what he refers to as his “dark notebook.” Though set in Korea and Vietnam, it amalgamates a variety of characters and tales, gathered from many assignments around the world. When asked if the story is a memoir, Bill replies, “No, but there’s a little of the Appo Kid in all of us.” He divides his time between Colorado Springs and Leadville, Colorado.

Includes Readers Guide

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Hardcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-527-4
366 pp.,$39.95

Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-022-4
366 pp.,$26.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-319-4
366 pp.,$3.99

“Kent Jacobs delivers a story with a rapid-fire pace that mixes murder, mystery, and interesting tidbits of New Mexico history that is sure to entertain.” —Michael McGarrity

“Jacobs is first-rate, delivering the reader effortlessly to war-era Fort Stanton and Lincoln, conceiving the perfect setting for suspense, betrayal and murder.” —Andrew J. Wulf, PhD, Executive Director, New Mexico History Museum and the Palace of the Governors

A mysterious murder faces border patrol agent Tracker Dodds as he assumes control of the first Prisoner of War camp in the United States under a mandate from the Department of Justice. It’s a hot summer day in 1942 when he enters Fort Stanton and he is shocked to discover a brutally scalped German inmate floating in its Olympic-sized swimming pool.

A river separates the camp from a state-of-the-art tuberculosis hospital in this alpine back country of southern New Mexico which adjoins the massive Mescalero Apache reservation. Could the scalping have been done by someone from the reservation? Or was the murderer another distressed German seaman? The camp is packed with German sailors. Did a bystander see the chance to silence his blackmailer?

Though the camp is remote and cut off from civilization, every soul involved feels the crushing destruction of a world at war. And the mysterious murder facing Tracker Dodds is just an example.

Includes Readers Guide.

Kent Jacobs is a graduate of Northwestern University College of Medicine with a specialty post-graduate diploma from the University of Colorado College of Medicine. His interest in writing began during his early years as a full-time academician. He is also the author of The Turned Field and Zuni Stew, both from Sunstone Press and he lives with his wife, professional painter Sallie Ritter in southern New Mexico. They received the New Mexico Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts in 2014, the state’s highest award in the arts.

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Website: http://kentfjacobs.com/

Softcover:
6 X 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-206-8
178 pp.,$22.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-534-1
178 pp.,$4.99

A twenty year old telephone switchboard operator, Susie Parks, whose life beyond one fateful night on March 9, 1916 during Pancho Villa’s raid on Columbus, New Mexico reveals her true strength.

On March 9, 1916, Susie Parks, age twenty, found herself in the center of battle the night Pancho Villa’s rebel army invaded the border town of Columbus, New Mexico. At the telephone switchboard with her baby in her arms, she made the call that alerted the outside world of the attack. She was celebrated as an American hero but her broader story reveals a tenacity and grit that surpasses the events of that day. We first meet Susie at eleven growing up in the Northwest when a family tragedy prompts the family to move to Columbus, New Mexico. There she grows up unencumbered, free to hunt and roam the desert. At eighteen, she meets Garnet Parks, an intellectual cavalry soldier with dreams of owning a newspaper. They fall in love and together traverse the Great War, the flu pandemic, and a devastating fire. All the while babies come, businesses falter, and illness strikes. Susie must run the paper, care for her family and nurse her dying husband. Against all odds, a chance discovery saves his life but leaves him with an addiction and both of them vulnerable to the treacherous influence of his troublemaking brother. Susie must navigate the challenge of her life for herself and for the sake of her children. Includes Readers Guide.

The author grew up in Southern California then taught for 23 years in the Seattle area where she raised two daughters. Now living on a farm in Western Oregon, she spins sheep wool and alpaca fleece and helps mind the menagerie. Upon an ancestry.com discovery that revealed unknown truths about what had become of her grandfather 88 years before, she began a four-year search to uncover the truth about her grandmother’s remarkable life.

On the Cover: Pancho Villa State Park, Columbus, New Mexico and Front Page of the Taunton Daily Gazette, Massachusetts, March 9, 1916.

Sample Chapter
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Website: https://www.susieparks.com/the-book

Hardcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-555-7
240 pp.,$34.95

Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-554-0
240 pp.,$24.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-729-1
240 pp.,$4.99

“I first heard about Henry McCarty from Chuck’s brother, director Eagle Pennell, decades ago. Chuck had uncovered an exciting take on Billy the Kid, and Eagle was obsessed with it. Unfortunately, the revisionist Western they might have made never happened, but that untold origin narrative has finally emerged as a well-crafted novel, with an incredible story to tell.” —Richard Linklater, Film Director. *CLICK ON "MOVIE/TV TREATMENT" BELOW.*

His name is Henry McCarty. One day the lad will be christened Billy the Kid and achieve world fame. But in 1875 he is just an obscure orphaned runaway traveling the Southwestern frontier. Enthralled with Hispanic culture and immersed in the twin arts of gambling and gunplay, Henry McCarty comes of age in boomtowns and barrios, in the wilds of the Chihuahua desert and the rugged high country of pine clad mountains.

After two years on the fertile training ground of an outpost named Camp Grant, a deadly encounter sends Henry back into the desert. An ominous journey follows, ultimately delivering him to Lincoln County, New Mexico, looking for redemption. He finds honest employment cowboying for a resolute young Englishman named John Tunstall, a twenty-three-year-old with an Oxford education and the world-weary look of a poet. But Henry quickly becomes entangled in the Londoner’s wildly escalating mercantile dispute. To survive, he must navigate a Russian novel’s wealth of characters and follow the tit for tat of a complex range war to its fiery conclusion.

Haunted by an Irish childhood in the slums of New York City, this strange boy possesses a stinging IQ and an epic grin, soaring ambitions and a fine tenor voice. When thrown into a hurricane of violence, Henry McCarty rises with an impassioned cause and a farsighted awareness of the machinery of fame and fate.

Chuck Pinnell is a veteran Austin guitarist, producer, film score composer and now, with the publication of The Irish Singer, a first-time novelist. He was born a short drive from the New Mexico border in Andrews, Texas, the grandson of a West Texas cattleman. In the late 1950s Chuck’s father resettled his wife and two sons in east Texas and entered a career in Civil Engineering at Texas A&M. His children grew up in the provincial town of College Station with A&M’s sprawling campus a few blocks out the front door. Both brothers gravitated to the creative mecca of nearby Austin soon after graduating high school. Chuck began his professional life by contributing a rousing guitar soundtrack to his filmmaking older brother’s first short feature, Hell of a Note. Chuck Pinnell went on to score a number of classic Texas films including The Whole Shoot’n Match, Last Night at the Alamo and An Unreal Dream: The Michael Morton Story as well as perform, produce, and record with many of the most talented musical artists in Texas. In 2018, Pinnell completely shifted gears with a deliberate retreat from the world of guitars, songwriters, and filmmakers to focus on a life-long passion—the untold origin story of Billy the Kid—returning three years later with an intensely researched and well-crafted novel. Bringing that story to the world was a shared obsession with his late-great indie pioneer brother, Eagle Pennell. The Irish Singer brings that quest full circle and the pact is finally complete.

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Hardcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-399-7
280 pp.,$36.95

Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-314-0
280 pp.,$22.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-616-4
280 pp.,$3.99

Historical fiction about a young farmer from Germany who migrated to Texas in 1845 with hopes of settling on a 320 acre land grant.

After the defeat of General Santa Anna in the year 1836, the Republic of Texas found itself with lots of land but few resources to protect it. One remedy was to issue land grants to military veterans and foreigners that would improve and occupy it. In 1845, the weak economic conditions in Germany motivated Joseph Schmidt, a young farmer, to apply for 320 acres of land at a place called Texas. It was a shock to his family, as it was “on the other side of the world” and it was not known if they would ever see each other again. When the tall ship landed on the shallow beaches of Texas, the immigrants learned that the horses and wagons that they had been promised were not there to take them into the interior of Texas. After a long wait, Joseph packed all his belongings on an ox-driven cart and left to locate his farmland. After a long trek, he located some German immigrants on the banks of a winding river. They advised him that they were unable to access the land grant as it was controlled by Comanche Indians. There, Joseph helped create a town named Anfang much like the towns of today that have a public building in the center of a town square. After a marriage to Jenell and the raising of boy and girl twins, their son was captured by Indians. After consulting a disabled Texas Ranger, Joseph leaves his wife and daughter to search for their son.

George A. Stehling is one of eleven children who spoke mostly German up until the time they entered grade school. While growing up, he and his siblings frequently worked and performed many duties in their family men’s clothing store. George graduated from St. Mary University in San Antonio, Texas, with a BBA degree. After serving in the Air Force reserves, he worked for General Motors Corporation for over twenty years with management positions in Texas and New Mexico. He later joined some of his brothers and sisters who had established a chain of Mexican restaurants. After the chain was later sold, he remained in Austin, Texas, to buy, improve, and resell small tracts of vacant land. The return to his hometown of Fredericksburg, Texas, gave him time to write this fictional story about the people, customs, and history of the vital mid-nineteenth century. As a descendent of the German pioneers who settled in Texas, he has an unwavering appreciation for the brave pioneers who prepared the way for us, wherever they may be or came from. He invites you to join this adventure without having to travel on a cargo ship, sleep under a grass covered roof, or learn to dance on a dirt surface.

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Hardcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-403-1
208 pp.,$36.95

Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-312-6
208 pp.,$19.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-613-3
208 pp.,$3.99

Don Carlos Buenaventura, the protagonist of The Last of Our Kind, is a powerful brujo living in Santa Fe, New Mexico, a remote settlement on the edge of Spain’s North American empire. The year is 1706. Comanche war parties are boldly conducting raids nearby, French traders and soldiers are aggressively expanding toward New Mexico from the Great Plains, and agents of the Spanish Inquisition have arrived in search of a brujo suspected of being in Santa Fe. That brujo is Don Carlos, respected citizen under the name of Don Alfonso Cabeza de Vaca, his true identity known only to a small coterie of friends. Given the many dangers that threaten the town, will he be able to bring his powers to bear and still keep his brujo identity secret? When his mortal enemy, a sorcerer with formidable powers, arrives on the scene in the midst of these troubles, how will Don Carlos figure out a way to deal with him? Includes Readers Guide.

A native Californian, Gerald W. McFarland received his B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley and his doctorate in U.S. history from Columbia University. He taught at the University of Massachusetts Amherst for forty-four years. During that time he published four books in his field. He received many honors, including a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship. The Colonial Dames of America cited his book, A Scattered People: An American Family Moves West, as one of the three best books in American history published in 1985. Since his retirement, he has turned to writing fiction and is the author of two previous novels in the Buenaventura Series, The Brujo’s Way and What the Owl Saw. He and his wife live in rural Western Massachusetts.

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Website: http://www.geraldwmcfarland.com

Hardcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-608-0
374 pp.,$42.95

Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-085-9
374 pp.,$26.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-420-7
374 pp.,$3.99

See "Movie/TV Treatment" below

In the spring of 1964, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) is recruiting white college students to teach in Freedom Schools and encourage Blacks to register to vote in the racial hotbed of Mississippi. At her best friend’s urging, Lenore Rogers, a white student at Barnard College in New York, signs up for the Freedom Summer Project. She is reluctant at first, but ultimately, her belief that segregation is unjust prevails along with her desire to make a difference. While in Ohio for training, Lenore learns what to expect—and how to protect herself—in the Jim Crow South. There she meets Luke, a young Black man working for SNCC. His expressive eyes hold the anger and pain that Black Americans have experienced for generations. When their arms inadvertently touch, she feels an instant, dangerous, spark. Working with archival material and foot soldiers who lived it, Layers of Truth brings to life many of the unsung heroes whose names will never make it into the history textbooks but who nevertheless put their lives on the line for the sake of true equality for Black Americans. Includes Readers Guide.

On the cover: Street scene, Sunflower County, Mississippi, 1964

Rosalie Turner’s passion is sharing Civil Rights Movement history, and she has been a guest lecturer in schools, universities, and museums. She and her husband, as volunteers, lead week-long university and church tours to iconic civil rights places in Alabama and Mississippi, states in which they have lived. An endowed professorship at Texas A & M University-Commerce was named in their honor for their work in Race and Reconciliation. Turner’s life has been centered around the importance of books and reading. In the several places they have lived, Turner has taught adult literacy, tutored in the schools, and set up summer reading programs in inner-city areas. She received the J.C. Penney Award for her summer reading program in inner-city Jacksonville, Florida. Turner and her husband live in Durham, North Carolina, and are the parents of three sons (the eldest lost to a rare leukemia at age ten) and six grandchildren. Layers of Truth is Rosalie Turner’s fifth historical novel. Her previous novels include Freedom Bound, about former slave Anna Kingsley, which won the Florida First Coast Writers award; Sisters of Valor, the story of the Vietnam War years from a service wife’s point of view, which won the Military Writers of America award; and March With Me, about the 1963 Children’s March in Birmingham, Alabama, which won the IndieFab Book of the Year award and was a finalist in the USA Best Book Awards.

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Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-537-3
248 pp.,$24.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-702-4
248 pp.,$4.99

Order from Sunstone: (505) 988-4418

In 1866, a Chiricahua Apache girl, Dah-zhonne, was eleven years old when a Mexican army unit attacked and decimated her band’s village. The horrible affair changed her life forever and she swore vengeance on the Mexican colonel, Lorenzo Garcia, who led the attack. Orphaned in the massacre, Dah-zhonne was rescued by American troops and adopted by an army surgeon, Jack Morgan. Morgan and his wife, Mary, soon moved to Philadelphia with the Indian girl they renamed Jada Morgan. Jada lived the upscale life of a wealthy young woman; apprenticed in Dr. Morgan’s medical practice; and received her MD degree from the Women’s Medical College of Pennsylvania. After two failed love affairs, she returned to the Southwest and became involved in a series of thrilling but sometimes dangerous adventures. Forced into Mexico by tribal dissidents where she was captured by Garcia, the man who killed her parents years earlier, she faces a lifetime as the colonel’s sex slave. But Jada escapes with six other women, and this daring breakout brings more unexpected dangers than they imagined. Includes Readers Guide.

Association with a Chiricahua Apache family for 19 years gives Bud Shapard an exceptional insight into Apache history and culture. His background in Indian history and culture was honed as the Research Services Officer for the Bureau of Indian Affairs. After his retirement to the North Carolina mountains in 1988, he spent his time writing. His first book, Chief Loco: Apache Peacemaker (University of Oklahoma Press, 2010), was the winner of the 2011 New Mexico Book Award for a Multi-cultural Subject.

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Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-097-2
254 pp.,$22.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-441-2
254 pp.,$4.99

Order from Sunstone: (505) 988-4418

Mountain Lion Charlie was a real person. Those few who were fortunate to know him and those who heard hand-me-down tales romanced his deeds unnecessarily. Charlie’s truths are more than sufficient. A mountain of a man, his life began in the late eighteen hundreds and extended through almost three quarters of the twentieth century. His is far different from the typical mountain man tales. There is little typicalness in Charlie’s story. Born in the wilderness, raised in the wilderness like no other, he became truly one with its wild inhabitants, his beloved mountains and above all their spirit. His personal unique existence abounded in adventure. A walking legend in elusive solitude that from the continent-long Rockies to the majestic High Sierra, inhospitable deserts and badlands to inaccessible mountain tops he mysteriously came and went, rarely retracing his steps. Stride for stride, mile by mile no man’s moccasin prints ever trekked more land or blazed new trails. This is his story, from birth to his disappearance.

Barend Van Kimball has spent decades trekking the Eastern Sierra mountain ranges. He was the first white man invited into the Big Pine sweat lodge and taught arrowhead making at the Paiute educational center. Prior to the 1970s he attended graduate school at Pepperdine University and was employed as a human factor engineer in Los Angeles before settling in Bishop, California, the permanent home for him, his wife and his eight children. Love of the great outdoors, the Sierras and the White Mountains are his most endearing pastimes. Owen’s River trout and the occasional mule deer grace his table. He is also the author of Tuck and Nip from Sunstone Press.

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Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-068-2
298 pp.,$24.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-399-6
298 pp.,$4.99

Includes Readers Guide. See Movie/TV treatment below.

A testament to strength and determination, Maud Hawk Wright recounts the true story of a young American woman who is kidnapped from her ranch in Chihuahua during the Mexican Revolution by Villista raiders. The raiders force her and her husband off their land, leaving their infant child with a hired hand, and shortly afterward, murdering her husband.

Bereft and grieving, Maud is taken to Pancho Villa’s encampment in the mountains, peopled by hundreds of revolutionaries, preparing for action. To her surprise, Maud is chosen to ride with Villa and four hundred of his soldiers to the north. Enduring a brutal nine-day trek through the mountains of northern Mexico with Villa and his small army, Maud witnesses the violent mania of Villa and his officers and learns the stories of people who follow him.

During the ride, Maud learns that she will become a participant in Villa’s grandiose plan to invade the United States. Before dawn of the ninth day of Maud’s captivity, she finds herself riding as a member of Villa’s army as it crosses the border to attack a small border town, Columbus, New Mexico. What happens is surprising.

Includes Readers Guide.

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Hardcover:
6 X 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-524-3
134 pp.,$32.95

Softcover:
6 X 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-102-3
134 pp.,$18.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-463-4
134 pp.,$4.99

Based on the true story of the 1860s New Mexico Territory teenager who was married to serial killer Charles Kennedy.

“…a vivid, pull-no-punches trip to the 1860s ‘Wild West’” —Historical Novel Review, November 1, 2017

It’s 1867 in New Mexico Territory. A log cabin huddles at the base of a lonely mountain pass east of Taos. Travelers who stop to rest and eat here should be careful how they look at the teenager who serves their food. Her husband, Charles Kennedy, is subject to jealous rages. At least, he says that’s why he kills and then robs the unwary. And then a baby is born. How can she raise a child in such circumstances? When Gregoria finally gets up the courage to go for help, she discovers that frontier justice can be as ugly as the actions it seeks to punish. This historical novel is based on the true story of the 1860s New Mexico Territory teenager who was married to serial killer Charles Kennedy. Includes Readers Guide.

Loretta Miles Tollefson grew up in the American West in a mountainside log cabin built by her grandfather. She holds two Master of Arts degrees from the University of New Mexico. She lives in New Mexico’s Rocky Mountains, where she seeks to accurately transform historical data about the region into fiction. She is the author of three poetry collections, two novels, and two collections of historical micro-fiction.

Softcover:
6 X 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-184-9
260 pp.,$22.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-516-7
260 pp.,$4.99

Two altar boys are found dead in the Santa Fe River, apparently murdered, thirty years apart. The first case was never solved, while the second unfolds in present time. The priest from Mora who worked closely with the boys is the obvious person of interest. But a woman from an old New Mexico Hispanic family with a Catholic background who is the homicide detective for the Santa Fe Police Department, and a second-generation New Mexico Anglo woman with a Baptist background who sees ghosts and is a member of a state task force formed to solve difficult cases, work closely together, as they have successfully on previous cases, to find the true killer. They realize quickly that it is possible the priest is the killer, but not probable. An old, retired, extremely well-educated and psychic priest in Jemez Springs haunted by visits from La Llorona his entire life becomes a major asset to the women as they move toward solving the case that seems to bring them nothing but dead ends—until the night it doesn't.

Includes Glossary and Readers Guide.

Elizabeth McIlhaney’s maternal great-grandparents homesteaded the lush San Juan River valley of New Mexico Territory in the nineteenth century. Two generations of their progeny worked in the Indian trading industry throughout the entire Southwest and Oklahoma as owners, managers, wholesalers and retailers well beyond the middle of the twentieth century. Beginning life in the North Valley of Albuquerque on her Texas-born father's dairy farm, Elizabeth participated in the ongoing relationship begun by her maternal family in 1851 with Baylor University, which both of her parents' families had by the 1890s, by earning a journalism degree there. She broke out of her family's traditions for women when she pursued a career as a newspaper reporter and editor, free-lance magazine writer and non-fiction book contributor spanning several decades in three states.

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Softcover:
6 X 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-238-9
200 pp.,$18.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-562-4
200 pp.,$4.99

In the early 1850s, twelve-year-old Peter Blair’s mother has died and his father has gone to Santa Fe to seek his fortune. Left in St. Louis, a friend has agreed to care for Peter. Before long his father’s acquaintance “Uncle” Seth goes back to St. Louis to check on Peter. But Peter is lonely and persuades his new uncle to take him to Santa Fe to be with his father. On the way, Uncle Seth leads their wagon train through an Indian attack, desertion by greenhorns, a buffalo stampede, a violent storm, and many other hardships. When Peter finally reaches his destination, he finds that his father is no longer in Santa Fe. Now he must go on yet another journey—one that almost proves fatal.

William Chapin Carson comes from a St. Louis family steeped in the history of that city and New Mexico. His great, great grandfather, William Carr Lane, was elected the first Mayor of St. Louis in 1823 and appointed the second Territorial Governor of New Mexico in 1852 by President Millard Fillmore. The journal he kept on his six-week trip from St. Louis to Santa Fe on the Santa Fe Trail forms the basis of Peter Becomes a Trail Man. Carson received a B.A. degree from Princeton University in 1950 and a M.B.A. from Stanford University in 1956. From 1950 to 1954 he served in the Air Force as a navigator on B-29 and RB-36 aircraft. He and his wife, Georgia, lived in Santa Fe for twenty-six years. The greater part of his career was involved with many aspects of education and early in 1998 Bill and Georgia initiated a program in a Santa Fe public elementary school to assist students from backgrounds of poverty. It has now grown to become the New Mexico affiliate of the national Communities in Schools organization assisting hundreds of students in ten schools. When the Carsons retired from active participation in 2017, the state legislature recognized their success and the mayor of Santa Fe designated March fourth as Bill and Georgia Carson Day. Carson is also the author of He Moved West with America, The Life and Times of Wm. Carr Lane: 1789-1863.

Cover artwork by Pat Oliphant. Pat Oliphant, now retired was one of the leading political cartoonists in the United States for decades. His work was syndicated in hundreds of newspapers and recognized through a wide range of prestigious awards. He has lived in Santa Fe for many years.

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Softcover:
6 X 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-226-6
192 pp.,$19.95

During the American Civil War, a young wife does everything in her power to keep close to her husband. (SEE MOVIE/TV TREATMENT BELOW)

By the late summer of 1863, the American Civil War has become entrenched into its third year, the bloody conflict raging far longer than could have been anticipated. The armies remain hungry for recruits in order to replenish their depleted ranks, the pressures being applied to all the corners of Union territory. The state of Iowa is no exception, here dwelling a certain newlywed couple, Susha and Sylvetus Potter. In no way do they wish to become separated. Nevertheless, Sylvetus succumbs to the persuasions and decides to enlist. However, Susha does her husband one better, concocting a scheme which would have her take on a manly pose, so that she might accompany him as a fellow soldier. That she has her arguments in perfect order makes it all the simpler for Sylvetus to acquiesce. Meanwhile, 800 miles to the south in Confederate Texas, Captain John Singleton is recovering from his severe wound under the care of his wife, Henrietta. Yet what she fears most is of his convalescence coming to an end, that he’ll return to the fight of which she and her husband have yet to embrace. John is torn between Henrietta’s gifted insights and intuitions and his own loyalties toward comradeship and duty. The war has too many campaigns waiting to be hatched, making it impossible to predict sure objectives. There is a good chance that Iowa will cross paths with Texas. The circumstances and encounters that may happen remain to be seen. So must trudge a private and her foes. Includes Readers Guide.

A native of the Lone Star state, with a B.S. in wildlife biology from Texas A&M University, Mark Gallik has merged his background with his lifelong passion for history and literature. The foregone conclusion is a penchant for research, to seek even the minutest of details. With that, the letters, journals and reminiscences of both military and civilian participants have been scoured, these discoveries exposing the treasures of regional tongues and varying mindsets. Naturally, the author fell into the trap of historical reenacting, from which not only did he learn the drill and rigors of campaigning, but also how to hand stitch period garments. It all provided invigorating and insightful experiences.

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Hardcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-517-5
384 pp.,$39.95

Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-332-4
384 pp.,$24.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-626-3
384 pp.,$4.99

Order from Sunstone Press: (800) 243-5644

The year is 1934 and drug-addicted Pedro Montoya thinks he is the reincarnation of Montezuma. With this conviction, he sets out to reverse the course of Mexican history. Believing his sister is Marina, the Indian princess who bore the illegitimate son of the Spanish conquerer Cortés, Pedro imprisons her and her lover who he thinks is Cortés and threatens to kill them if they don’t “re-conceive” their son Martín. He is convinced that Martín, sided by the war god Huitzilopochtli, will annihilate the Spaniards this time. This bizarre fantasy of suspense, youthful love, and history is set in the American Southwest, where enchantment and sensuality often prove to be reality.

Clarence W. Dawson, author of numerous magazine articles and Sunday newspaper features, is the author of two other novels, Desert Vendetta and Beebuzzards Atop the Carcass. Born in Louisiana, Dawson spent most of his life in Texas, where he taught high school Spanish, English, and journalism. While teaching the latter subject, he was proclaimed Texas’ Journalism Teacher of the Year and was inducted into the Order of the Golden Quill. He holds BA and MA degrees from Hardin-Simmons University.

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Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-0-86534-162-3
124 pp.,$18.95

"At its heart, New Mexico is the protagonist of this novel...Eichstaedt's descriptions of the state, and the city of Santa Fe, show a deep familiarity with the Land of Enchantment." --The Santa Fe New Mexican.

“The Ridge” is an enticing story. What makes it so is not just the compelling plot but also the book’s accuracy. Characters are true to life, not cliches, and Eichstaedt’s descriptions of northern New Mexico are vivid. Luke’s reportorial accounts read like the real thing. Eichstaedt is spot-on with his depiction of small-town Hispanics, and the arrogant anti-media lines from the rancher who heads the club might have come out of the mouth of a Washington pol. “The Ridge” is a little gem. --Sandra Dallas, The Denver Post

SEE MOVIE/TV TREATMENT BELOW.

Burned out and world-weary, veteran journalist Luke Jackson longs for a story to put him back on the front page of The New Mexican, Santa Fe’s historic daily newspaper. hat story comes when he ventures north to cover a land grant protest in the state’s pastoral and predominately Hispanic region. The protest leaders want to reclaim grazing rights given to their ancestors by the Spanish and Mexican governments several hundred years earlier, but now lost. Those rights were wrongly ignored, they contend, when the present-day Southwest, including California, became part of the United States in 1848 under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. The treaty ended the war between the United States and Mexico. Rather than remaining with the original grantees, large sections of the land were grabbed by the railroad companies carving their way to the West Coast.The Hispanic community, more hungry and desperate than ever for land to graze their growing flocks, take up arms and occupy the land. A standoff with authorities ensues and Luke finds himself caught in the middle of a fight over land rights with roots deep in the history of the American Southwest that takes all he has to get out alive and write the story of a lifetime. A suspenseful literary thriller set in a remote and exotic corner of the American Southwest, The Ridge will put you on the edge of your seat and keep you there. Includes Readers Guide.

Peter Eichstaedt is a former long-time resident of northern New Mexico. He was a reporter with The New Mexican and The Albuquerque Journal newspapers who covered issues in northern New Mexico and in the New Mexico Legislature. He is a former U.S. Fulbright scholar and he taught journalism in Albania, Slovenia, and Armenia. For two years he was the country director in Kabul, Afghanistan, for the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, where he worked with Afghan journalists promoting free speech and good journalism.

On the Cover: The poster in the cover image is by Emanuel Martinez. Use by permission.

Sample Chapter
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Hardcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-637-0
208 pp.,$34.95

Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-534-2
208 pp.,$23.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-718-5
208 pp.,$4.99

One man’s hunt for ex-Nazis leads to a shocking revelation and reconciliation with his own troubled past in this 1940s historical novel set in Los Angeles and Sacramento.

Los Angeles, 1949. Attorney Andrew Martin, aka Andrés Martinez, is doing what he does best: surviving. His career is stable, he has his pick of women, and his beloved parrot, Emerson, keeps him company. True, he’s still lamenting his rejection from the military, still tormented by memories of his father, and then there’s his leg, which continually feels like an imposter. But he’s learned to live with all of that, too. Until the arrival of Penny, that is, a member of the Salvation Army, a stranger with a secret. Andrew’s meeting with the woman is brief, but what he learns from her upends him. Suddenly nothing makes sense. He desperately needs to get away, and it seems the gods are listening, for he’s soon offered a job in Sacramento. And not just any job. He’s been asked to help confirm a plot that the government is using ex-Nazis to spy on communists in the U.S. The timing seems perfect, and Andrew agrees. What he doesn’t know is that this quest will lead him straight into the heart of that from which he is trying to escape. Includes Readers Guide.

Ona Russell holds a PhD in American literature from UC San Diego, where she also taught for many years. She’s a frequent speaker at literary events, including the famed San Miguel de Allende Writers’ Conference. Her essays and academic articles have appeared in literary and legal journals nationwide. Sunstone Press published her three previous novels, including The Natural Selection, a California Book Award finalist, and Rule of Capture, an IPPY silver medal winner for regional fiction. Ona lives in Solana Beach, California. Please visit onarussell.com for more information.

Cover design by Lauren Kahn.

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Hardcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-336-2
224 pp.,$29.95

Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-298-3
244 pp.,$19.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-588-4
224 pp.,$3.99

With the Cold War raging and espionage flourishing, a summer of innocent pranks turns deadly.

It seems J.T. and Mickey will never learn. This summer they’ve decided to break the record (for the most original pranks) of the immortal Judd and Howie. They begin their quest by setting off cherry bombs in their sixth-grade classroom, then progress to dropping dummies (mannequins) from overhanging trees in front of California tourists and continue by placing cracker balls under the Sunday school chairs of the senior citizens. Unfortunately, their next prank goes very wrong. During a game of Town Bell, they lock a friend/rival, Weird Willie, in English stocks. Unfortunately, when they return to release him, Willie has vanished. Set during the Cold War of the 1950s, with Soviet espionage looming as an ominous backdrop, this also is an era when society is more tolerant of juvenile pranks. Sheriff Meecham, however, is getting fed up with the boy’s shenanigans and threatens if they don’t produce Willie soon, he’ll charge them with murder. Includes Readers Guide.

Following graduation from the University of Utah Medical School, Dr. Stucki practiced urology in southern Utah for thirty-eight years. At St. George Regional Medical Center, he served as Chief of Surgery, Chief of Staff and as a member of the Hospital Governing Board. Presently, he teaches two classes and is vice president of the Institute of Continued Learning at Utah Tech University. Town Bell is the prequel to his first, and highly popular Boy’s Pond. His Doctor Cooper Series includes: The Death of Samantha Rose, Hemorrhage, Mountain Mayhem and The Reluctant Carnivore. Stucki is the author of a medical mystery, Hunting for Hippocrates and an historical novel, Sagebrush Sedition, chronicling the creation of The Grand Staircase National Monument. All novels are published by Sunstone Press.

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Hardcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-640-0
318 pp.,$42.95

Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-550-2
318 pp.,$28.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-721-5
318 pp.,$4.99

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This collection of stories describes events or episodes in the life of a varied group of individuals during the most dramatic period of American history—the settlement of the American West. The reader will witness the hardship and suffering of the Donner-Reed Party; the heroism of Portugee Phillips, the messenger bringing news of the Fetterman Massacre; the tragic events connected to Major John W. Powell's exploration of the Grand Canyon; and the disastrous effort of the Minnesota Sioux to drive the white interlopers from their traditional hunting grounds. There is a glimpse of the rough and tumble life in the gold rush towns of Alaska and Colorado, a failed attempt at a robbery of a bank in Northfield, Minnesota, and the violent death of Jack Slade, a former manager of a stage coach station in Julesburg, Colorado, mentioned in Mark Twain's book, Roughing It. Historical notes at the end of the tales provide the reader with actual facts and broader context in which these events took place.

Jiri Cernik was born in Jicin, Czechoslovakia and immigrated to the United States in 1967 where he earned an MA in German language and literature at George Washington University. He has worked at the Foreign Service Institute, Educational Bureau of the U.S. Department of State as the Language Training Supervisor of Czech, Slovak, Serbian, Bosnian, Croatian, Bulgarian, Hungarian and Greek sections. In addition to his work in the field of linguistics and language pedagogy he has pursued his interest in American history, particularly the settlement of the American West. He has traveled extensively throughout all states west of the Mississippi and is the author of several novels, stories and non-fiction works dealing with this area and people who settled it. Two, published in the Czech Republic, are The Wild West and With a Tomahawk Against the Muskets, a two-volume detailed history of the Indian Wars covering the time period 1621–1890. He is retired and lives with his wife in Needmore, Pennsylvania where for many years they have raised and showed Morgan horses.

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Softcover:
6 X 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-082-8
160 pp.,$19.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-402-3
160 pp.,$4.99

Little is known about the boyhood of the real Billy the Kid, but this is the way it could have gone for him during his growing-up years, shared here with his fictional best pal, Willie the Kid.

Both born in New York City in 1859, William Tweed Bonnifield acquires the nickname Willie the Kid when he emerges from the womb laughing, but William Henry McCarty won’t be christened Billy the Kid until he becomes notorious many years later. The fatherless boys meet in an Indianapolis classroom when Billy hits Willie with a hard-boiled egg and Willie doesn’t snitch. They become bosom buddies, and their mothers, Charlotte and Catherine, bond as two struggling “widows.” Mischief maker Billy proves popular with boys and girls alike. Well-behaved Willie looks for direction, for better or worse, from Billy. After Indianapolis, the close families stay connected in Wichita, Kansas, and Denver, Colorado, before venturing to New Mexico Territory. In Santa Fe Catherine marries would-be gold prospector Bill Antrim; later, in Silver City, Charlotte weds carpenter Fred Schellschmidt. Willie and Billy must deal with growing pains, worrisome mothers, indifferent stepfathers, Wild West hard cases, teachers, lawmen, and a deadly case of consumption. When his mother dies, teenaged Billy is set adrift, commits a minor crime, escapes jail, and runs off to the Arizona Territory. Of course, his best pal comes along. But how long can they stick together? The bolder of the two is destined to become the infamous Billy the Kid. But will Willie the Kid follow the same outlaw path or will the boyhood amigos live out different lives in New Mexico? Includes Readers Guide.

The author grew up in New York and Ohio, majored in history at the University of New Mexico, and worked for newspapers in Hobbs and Las Cruces, as well as New York City, Missoula, Montana, and Leesburg, Virginia. His previous historical novels include Captured: From the Frontier Diary of Danny Duly (2014), Our Frontier Pastime 1804-–1815 (2019), Man from Montana (2021), The Call of McCall (2022), and Mountain Woman: How She Defied the Odds in the Time of the Mountain Men (2023). Greg lives in Virginia but periodically returns to New Mexico to visit his old haunts and those of the Kid.

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Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-635-6
174 pp.,$22.95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-737-6
174 pp.,$3.99

From the Ukrainian-Russian front to the horrors of Hamburg’s firestorm, Nick Hrab somehow manages to survive and find love in a world turned upside down with hate.

When It All Comes Around is based on the story of the author’s brother and sister-in-law, who emigrated from the Ukrainian/Romanian border area, during World War II. In this tale of survival during wartime. Nick Hrab had just begun milking his family cow one morning when the invading Russian army sends him racing beneath a hailstorm of bullets. With half their family and half their village murdered, the Hrab family fights with the underground resistance for a short time before seeking shelter in Germany. Meanwhile, Hilda, the daughter of a locomotive engineer, is growing up on the sheltered island of Lindau, Germany, directly below the Swiss, German and Italian Alps. After her father is sent to Paris, she and her mother live in Munich, for a time, but the bombing is so heavy they must return to Lindau for safety, only to be caught up in the vengeance of their French and Turkish captors. After a night of Christmas dancing, where Nick and Hilda fall in love, they decide to go to America. Having given up everything for love, Hilda embraces the challenges of leaving everything behind to start a new life in America, while her mother-in-law secretly seeks to destroy her reputation and friendships abroad.

Steven M. Best grew up in the Great Lakes region, in Minnesota, Michigan and Ohio. After a tour of duty in Vietnam, he married into a Ukrainian family, whose story of survival during World War II seemed somewhat of an epic love tale. After retiring from private practice, Best spent several years researching and writing Nick and Hilda’s special story of finding love in a world turned upside down by hate. His first novel, When Philosophers Were Kings, also from Sunstone Press, told the story of his family's many trials during the Civil War, and was critically acclaimed by Midwest Book Review and many others. After its release in 2004, Best received honorable mention at the Georgia Writer of the Year Awards. This is his second novel.

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Softcover:
6 x 9
ISBN: 978-1-63293-528-1
180 pp.,$22,95

eBook:
ISBN: 978-1-61139-696-6
180 pp.,$4.99