R. Lawson Gamble's Blog: R Lawson Gamble Books, page 7

Coming Soon: "Lost Oasis"

My Zack Tolliver, FBI series continues with the latest adventures of Eagle Feather and Zack Tolliver in the forthcoming novel LOST OASIS, due May first. This mystery summons Zack to the desert wastes of the northernmost Eagle Mountains in the Sonoran Desert, once part of Joshua Tree National Park but later reclaimed by private interests for mining.

Here resides the largest contemporary ghost town in the U.S. and the remnants of the Kaiser Steel open pit iron mines. The deserted company town, a city unto itself at the time, was the birthplace of one of the most successful health plans of today, perhaps the only remaining tangible benefit of the operation.

Now the area is being repurposed as a reversible pumped storage facility, a huge hydraulic electricity storage battery in the desert. The concept is simple: fill a large reservoir with water, use solar power by day to pump the water to another reservoir at a higher elevation, then release the water to run back down hill by night, turning a turbine to generate electricity as it descends. Then repeat.

In LOST OASIS, world-renown scientist Carl Scheidecker, contracted by EverSun Corporation and Santini & Marsh Design & Construction Company, mysteriously disappears while inspecting sites in the desert. His tracks lead to an extinct oasis, then disappear. Foul play is suspected, but by whom? Zack is assigned to the case. But even as he begins his investigation, someone attaches a bomb to his Jeep and he barely escapes with his life.

As Zack begins interviews with company employees, he receives an unexpected call from his boss, Janice Hooper. She informs him the FBI investigation has been suspended and he is to pack it up immediately. Aware now that very powerful forces are afoot, Zack refuses to give up, particularly since Eagle Feather is somewhere out in the desert, unable to communicate, with a very dangerous assassin on the loose.

Be sure to keep an eye out for LOST OASIS on presale at Amazon. And until then, if you have missed any of the eight prior books in the series, visit my author page at Amazon.com and catch up.

A Local Author’s First Western – Some Thoughts On JOHNNY AND THE KID

R Lawson Gamble writes history, mystery, and murder with cross-culture comradeship and Native American mysticism in his popular series “Zack Tolliver, FBI”. The series is eight books long with a prequel. Book number nine is due in the spring of 2020.

Now, something new is in the wind. The author has just published “Johnny And The Kid” under his imprint Rich Gamble Associates. The subtitle “An Old Time Western” tells it all. The novel picks up where Elmore Leonard’s “Hombre” and Larry McMurtry’s “Leaving Cheyenne” leave off, with a down-home easy-reading story narrated by a teenage boy in the middle of the fracas as it happens.

This new novel has stirred unusual interest. For example:

☛After “Johnny” returned from the editors, this note was attached:
“I want to point out that if you notice the two spellings of blond/blonde it is because blond = male and blonde = female. That said, this is an excellent story, and I enjoyed it tremendously. The character development is so well done that it’s as if Johnny was sitting in my living room telling the story. The plots and subplots are wonderful. I love the who’s who that kept the suspense heightened. It’s the best book I’ve read this year. Well done! Readers’ Favorite Team Member – Fiona”

☛Shortly after publication, the book received its first review on Amazon, rated Five Stars:
Don’t miss this brilliant, classic western!
December 16, 2019
Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase
“R. Lawson Gamble has written another thrilling novel, a western in which vividly drawn characters face the harsh and dangerous world of the Old West. Mr. Gamble’s people are complex, fascinating and really come to life in this suspenseful story of Johnny, a boy facing overwhelming threats to himself and his community. The author’s typical mastery of historical and visual detail made me feel as if I were right there in the dusty town as secrets emerged and the evil was coming closer. I hope to see Johnny again, and of course, Mr. Gamble’s Zack Tolliver series heroes as well!”

An Interview with R Lawson Gamble

Interviewer: “Johnny And The Kid” marks a change in genre and writing style for you, does it not?”
RL: “It does. My real love is Western Literature and my shelves are full of Tony Hillerman, Owen Wister, Louis L’Amour, T.T. Flynn, Elmore Leonard, Larry McMurtry, Philipp Meyer––I could go on. When I wrote my first novel “The Other” (that somehow became the first book of a series) my intention was to include everything I loved in a novel. Its success put me on a production treadmill for several years. But I’ve always wanted to write a true Western story.
Interviewer: Is this the first time you’ve written in the first person POV (point of view)?
RL: “Yes and it was a wonderful experience. I have admired those authors who have written great books in the first person. It is such an intimate yet compelling voice. You are there in the middle of the action. You feel what the narrator feels as he or she feels it. But editors warn us away from using it because it is so difficult to do well. You can never forget who you are in the telling, you must remember the inclusions and limitations of your perception.
Interviewer: “Do you feel you have succeeded?”
RL: “Yes, I do. I found it easy to write. I became Johnny, I saw the action unfold before me. I felt the angst, the fear, the pride, sadness, the love Johnny felt as he felt it. The story flowed.”
Interviewer: “Johnny And The Kid” is a short novel compared to “Mestaclocan” and “Canaan’s Secret”, for example. Was that intentional?”
RL: “I have two answers to that question. Generally speaking, my stories end when they end. It is why some novels in the Zack Tolliver series are over four hundred pages and others less than two hundred. When I set out to write “Johnny And The Kid” I expected more action and dialogue than introspection and narrative. Johnny is a fifteen-year-old boy at the beginning of the story and like most teenagers doesn’t spend a lot of time musing. He reacts. His actions are shaped by events and the people around him, not the other way around.”
Interviewer: “Will there be more of Johnny?”
RL: “I expect so. Of course, I will continue my “Zack Tolliver, FBI” series as long as readers want to follow Zack and Eagle Feather. I do enjoy writing those novels. As for Johnny, he has just begun his life as a gunfighter and I as much as anyone want to know what happens to him.”

Tolliver Tales December Issue

Article:

New Western Novel
This newest novel from R Lawson Gamble is a change of pace from his ZACK TOLLIVER, FBI series, a hard-riding Western full of action and great new characters. Just the thing for an escape into the Old West, it is now on Amazon for pre-purchase. Real fiction, fast and fun. Buy your copy now for $2.99 before the post-publication price goes up!

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You may not have noticed the cover of LAS CRUCES is laid out upon a map of the original land grant. An old adobe remains, although in ruins. The area is still wild and open, now a California State Park, and much of the tantalizing history may still be found by those who know where to look for it. The novel already has twenty positive reviews.

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AWARD WINNER!
CANAAN’S SECRET, ZACK TOLLIVER, FBI Book #6 took a Bronze in the Readers Favorite International Book Contest in the most difficult category of Fiction>Mystery>Murder. We are proud of Zack. This award came with an invitation to the formal award ceremony, a posh event in Miami where a medallion was presented to winning authors, although we declined to attend. It occurred during the Miami Book Fair, considered the nation’s premier literary festival where CANAAN’S SECRET was sold in the Readers Favorite booth.

Closer to home, at 99 years of age, the author’s mother is a first-time author! We published her children’s book CHURCH PIGEON this past month. It has been extremely well received in the retirement home and by mom’s church where she holds the title of the oldest parishioner. She is scheduled for several talks and a visit from the Deacon.

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ZACA MESA WINERY
September was a busy month. Our first event was at Talley Winery in Arroyo Grande on September 8. We joined several local authors to discuss our books and helped raise funds for P.E.O. which finances young women’s education. On September 22 at ZACA MESA WINERY the author read and discussed excerpts from ZACA, Zack Tolliver book #3 (you may remember the novel takes place in the vicinity of that winery). We were under a tree in the beautiful Grenache Blanc Vineyard. At the end of the month, we attended the James Ersfeld Symposium on Western Writing at Great Falls, Montana in the C.M. Russell Museum (a special place). The trip was shortened by a freak blizzard which we barely escaped with a flight to Salt Lake City. A frozen stabilizer made for an exciting landing there.

An Old Time Western

Yes, I have written an old-time western, the sort of book I’ve always wanted to write. Think T.T. Flynn, Louis L’Amour, early Elmore Leonard or less lengthy Larry McMurtry. Think the tiny town in post Civil War Texas surviving solely through the occasional off-course cattle drive, the widowed woman and her young son scrounging to make ends meet, the vibrant saloon, the robber gang, the Texas Ranger hunting them down––it’s all there.

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Not to worry, Zack Tolliver and Eagle Feather will continue to solve mysterious murders and face up to the spirit world right on schedule in the ZACK TOLLIVER, FBI novel series with the usual unusual history, Native American mythology, enchanting landscapes and unique individuals that earmark them. That series continues, the next novel due mid-spring 2020.

This book, however, is pure entertainment, pure fiction, pure fun, and excitement. The title is JOHNNY AND THE KID. I expect it will be available for pre-sale purchase soon on Amazon with the publication date of December 15, 2019. It is my holiday gift to you––and to myself.

I did not pour over old tomes, spend hours locating court records or read old newspaper articles for this novel. Instead, my research involved rereading the earmarked old-time westerns clinging to their dusty shelves. I just wrote. In short, I was doing what I love to do.

I hope in reading it you will be doing what you love to do as well. Watch for it on Amazon Books under Kindle Hot New Releases beginning this month, November 15.

For those who are interested in book metadata and detail, I have written JOHNNY AND THE KID in the first person POV throughout. It was an interesting challenge yielding positive results. My formatting includes a single line space between all paragraphs sans indent, styled after Loki’s Publishing re-release of THE VIRGINIAN (this nod should not be taken as blanket approval of all Loki’s Publishing products––they happened to get this one just right). The work will appear initially as a Kindle Book and soon after publication (again December 15) be followed by the physical volume. KDesigns will create the cover.

If you love westerns, particularly those that lead inevitably to a great shootout at the end, this one is for you.

In October, Readers Reach for MESTACLOCAN

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With the advent of Hallowe’en the question of which of the Zack Tolliver, FBI, novels is the scariest has occupied my mind. All have suspenseful moments, as intended, but some, because of paranormal or supernatural elements involved in a greater portion of the plot take the suspense to a higher level. This question comes to mind because I am sometimes asked to do author readings during October, this season of witches, goblins, and graves.

Last season, I drew from moments in several of my novels. This method provided the greatest collection of thrills, perhaps, but less continuity. After watching sales of MESTACLOCAN eBooks and pages on Amazon rise during this season, I decided to excerpt all my readings from that particular novel.

In MESTACLOCAN, the second novel in the series, the terror begins immediately as the reader becomes privy to the thoughts of a shapeshifting creature that preys upon unwary humans in the green spaces of San Francisco. Zack and Eagle Feather follow a tortuous path of clues on the trail of someone or something of great power, ruthlessness, and intelligence – a predator of ferocious cruelty and appetite. There is increasing urgency to their task when they discern a chronological pattern to the killings: they occur every nine days. And, of course, the next is almost upon them.

The reader follows the victims to their doom as each step up to the moment of death is chronocled. Piecing together the thoughts of both predator and victims increases the tension and horror of the story. The deaths seem inevitable. There is no stopping this creature.

The final haunted stalking of his selected victims by the monster along the paths of Lands End under a full moon through the patches of fog, punctuated by unearthly howls, will not fail to elevate the heart rate of the reader.

Each novel in the Zack Tolliver, FBI, series differs not only by plot and physical location but also by the degree of mysticism and supernatural content. MESTACLOCAN has the most of the latter. A single glance at the cover of the book discloses the spooky nature of this read.

For those who enjoy scaring themselves to sleep at night when the moon is full and the darkness comes early, you will find all you seek in MESTACLOCAN.

Interview: S. Y. Valley Star

R. Lawson Gamble interview by Pamela Dozois for a feature
article appearing in the Santa Ynez Valley Star September 16, 2019
R. Lawson Gamble has just launched his latest novel, “Las Cruces,” the seventh in his Zack Tolliver, FBI series.
Q: “What is it about?”
A: “It builds upon historic events in Las Cruces on the Gaviota Coast. It takes Zack Tolliver and his companion-in-adventure Eagle Feather on a wild ride from the Chumash Casino to Vandenberg Air Force Base and many places in between.”
Q: “Why here?”
A: “The book focuses on the Gaviota Pass and the Las Cruces land grant, site of a triple murder in the 1860s that was never solved. The overtaxed gas and oil infrastructure of the Gap, the rare archeological sites, and the dark, haunting beauty of its deep arroyos and wind-carved caves are all woven into the story.”
Q: “Was there anything about your youth that suggested you would become a novelist one day?”
A: “I lived in a rural area of New Jersey, three miles from the nearest town. As a child, I started watching Hopalong Cassidy but then the television broke down and my parents decided they wouldn’t fix it. Once the TV disappeared, the books came out. We had books from floor to ceiling in the living room of my home. My siblings and I would graze the library wall for different reading material. I never watched television again until my first year in college.”
Q: “Why did you begin writing so late in life?”
A: “I began a career as a baritone soloist in Newport, R.I. but it soon became apparent a performance career would not support my family. I took a position in a private boarding school and worked there for the next 34 years.”
Q: “What happened next?”
A: “I was approached about creating a full school leadership department in a private school in the Central Coast. But by the time I was able to make the move to California the economy had collapsed and the school was unable to fulfill its promise. It was then I turned to writing, first articles for the local papers, then my first novel.”
Q: “What made you decide upon a fiction mystery series?”
A: “I wanted to write a novel and thought it would just be a one-time thing. I didn’t know if I could write one and I certainly didn’t know it would turn into the first book in a series. I couldn’t find the kind of books that used to capture my imagination. I decided to include all those elements including the supernatural, Native American culture, Westerns, and mystery in the one book. I never imagined that I would have to repeat all of them in book after book.”
Q: “What other books have you written?”
A: “I have written a pictorial history “Los Alamos Valley” published by Arcadia Press and an allegorical anthropomorphic story for children “Payu’s Journey”.

What It’s All About

(Excerpt from author’s talk about his Zack Tolliver, FBI series at Talley Winery)

My murder mystery series Zack Tolliver, FBI began with my novel THE OTHER, which at the time was intended to be just that, a novel.

Because it was conceived in my mind as a single stand-alone project, I saw it as my first and last chance to incorporate everything I personally liked in a good read. Thus we have a murder mystery in the dusty paths and prickly flora of the beautiful wild southwest landscapes of Arizona and southern California, a romance, a good dog, two different nations of indigenous peoples, two main protagonists from completely different cultures, illicit drugs of various types, three different kinds of law enforcement, mummification, salt production, mysticism, shape shifters.

Did I leave anything out?

I didn’t even know if I could write a book. But I could and did. I published it and it sold well and the question of a series arose. That’s when I realized I may have made a mistake putting everything I had into the first book.

Where could I possibly go from there?

Well, I went to San Francisco for MESTACLOCAN, my second book. My son’s family was in the city at the time and I am a trail runner and during each visit I would run in the green spaces¬¬––Golden Gate Park, the Presidio, Twin Peaks, Buena Vista Park. I came to realize one could virtually traverse the city without ever leaving a green space. Hmmm. What if some inhuman predator hid away in those green areas picking off unwary hikers and visitors? Could happen!

So the series was on its way.

By changing my location, I had unwittingly given myself a certain amount of freedom not available to fictional hometown sheriffs or tribal lawmen. My FBI Agent could be called to go wherever he was needed. And I would have a new place to explore, to run the trails, to meet the people, to learn the area history.

I already had plenty of knowledge of the Santa Ynez Valley area. Living in Los Alamos, I spend a lot of time running in the nearby foothills and mountains. For book #3, ZACA, I took a deeper look at the immigration situation, the marijuana growers, the cartels, the Panga boats left on the shore and brought in local law enforcement, the Chumash, and legends and superstitions from Zaca Lake and Zaca Mountain and the wilderness beyond.

Sometimes fiction and real life intertwine. This occurred several times with Zaca, most notably from running trails beyond Colson Canyon off Tepusquet Canyon. In the long, steep arroyos I saw bits of black irrigation tube, passed well traveled unofficial side trails, and even spotted an area of different colored green growth on an inaccessible hillside. This fired my imagination to place an illegal marijuana grow in that area, where my poor Jesús would be made to labor in my novel, and where Pedro the Pacifier, my cartel assassin, would meet the monster that was his doom.

Later on in the novel I had law enforcement raid the site, lowering themselves out of helicopters because of the steep cliffs only to find their quarry had disappeared along a hidden path I named El Camino de Burro. I wrote this novel and published it in 2015.

In 2018 an article appeared in the SUN titled Authorities Destroy 100,000-plus illegal pot plants in Los Padres. It goes on to describe how county sheriff deputies and federal authorities raided remote areas in the mountains just east of Santa Maria. They used helicopters to drop into sites due to the rugged terrain. “There’s really no trails except the ones the illegal growers made,” was one quote. “Their knowledge of the terrain at times surpassed investigators and enforcement teams,” was another.

Apparently I had been spot on.

With Zack Tolliver novel #4, CAT, I wanted to return to the Navajo country, culture, and mysticism I had engaged in THE OTHER. In a manner similar to MESTACLOCAN, where chapters begin with thoughts of the predator, I wanted to take the reader inside the Navajo shape shifter, the Skinwalker. What was it like for a human to become an animal, in this case a great cat, to float down the steep hillsides and fly from pinnacle to outcrop with great leaps. My research took me deep into the mysticism and culture surrounding the Skinwalker, a depraved Navajo priest willing to forego all reasonable humanity to achieve these dark powers. The reality continues to exist in the minds of many Navajo. Navajo Nation Police are still called out to respond to complaints of Skinwalkers.

The plot for UNDER DESERT SAND came to me while visiting a unique area of the Mojave Desert called the Mojave Preserve. The history I stumbled onto so resembled fiction I was hard pressed to create a story from it – but I did. The real story involves what was likely the last actual gunfight of the old west, a town that is now dust, and a cattle empire that hired gunfighters to protect itself from cattle thieves. I jeeped and ran isolated trails far from the nearest gasoline and water and found relics of the real story still in place. The book’s cover illustration could literally be the place the 1925 gunfight took place. Except for a missing bunk house the terrain hasn’t changed. You wonder as you pass through how huge herds of cattle could have grazed and an entire town develop in such a dry, sand-blown place, but they did.

Zack Tolliver is called here to investigate what appears to be a theatrical gunfight fashioned on the original but gone terribly wrong. Two young men are found a distance apart, both dead from a gunshot wound, both holding a pistol with one chamber fired. A closer look, however, suggests it is murder devised to appear as a gunfight. As the investigation deepens, Zack finds the murder/gunfight hides intrigue even more ominous.

I fell into the plot for CANAAN’S SECRET completely by accident. On my return from a trail half marathon held at Page, Arizona, I passed through the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints town of Colorado City without realizing it, although the distinct lack of fast food and service stations in the area did not escape my notice. I stopped at Pipe Spring National Monument on the Kaibab-Paiute Reservation. In actuality, it is a Mormon Fort where once and future extra wives were stored away out of sight when polygamy became an issue up north in Salt Lake City. From there they would be trucked off across the flat grass land of the Kaibab Plateau by wagon to St. George, Utah to be married. The wagon tracks can still be seen.

My research into all things Mormon, the Paiutes, and the amazing land of the Vermillion Cliffs for this novel is too vast and, well, novel, to go into now. I will say, given the contentiousness of the Fundamentalists even now, I was careful to change names and identities, particularly in reference to law enforcement. After carefully changing one particular name, imagine my chagrin when a few months after the book’s publication a man with that exact name transferred into the local sheriff’s department. Go figger!

My latest book in the Zack Tolliver, FBI series is LAS CRUCES. The paperback copies arrived just this past month and are with me tonight. Here once again I stumbled upon an incredible story that led to the plot. Las Cruces is an original Mexican land grant just north of Gaviota Gap, one of three viable passes for travelers from Santa Barbara over the Santa Ynez Mountain range. When the stage coach company routing through Gaviota in the 1860s decided to change the location of its transfer station there was fierce competition. These were the years following the great drought that marked the end of the cattle industry in the area, people had limited resources, and station proprietorship offered substantial additional income.

A couple named Corliss, local sheepherders, won the bid. Soon after they were found murdered and their newly built station house burnt down around them. Mrs. Corliss had evidently escaped out the window only to be attacked and dragged still alive back into the house where she was deposited atop her dead husband. The house was then secured from the outside and burnt. Their shepherd was found days later in one of the deep gashing ravines, his head nearly severed from his body.

My research took me to Oregon Territory and deeper into the lives of the Corliss’ where the irony surrounding their deaths appeared almost unbelievable when I found they had been attacked once before in a house and Mrs. Corliss had escaped out a window and saved herself then. My novel, LAS CRUCES, was very difficult to write because fact so very nearly overwhelmed fiction. Where do you go from such a story? I found a way, as you will see as you read it, but I will say the real story deserves a thorough telling in its own time.

This may seem a strange time to talk about THE DARK ROAD, my novella written as a precursor to the series, but it is close to the order of things as they actually happened. A pair of writers in my genre reached out to me in the spring of 2018 suggesting we team up and each write a story describing our series protagonists before they became who they were to become. We’d put them together under a single cover and place the book on Amazon as a free book. The hope and idea was to create interest and leach readers from one series to another.

I found it an interesting idea and agreed and began writing an additional volume between series volumes six and seven. That summer suddenly became very crowded. We got the volume published by late October under the title WESTERN JUSTICE. It performed well for several months. We had agreed to keep the eBook free forever, not to publish a paperback, but when the benefits of the volume seemed to fade for us individually we agreed we might each publish our own novella as a separate book to kick off our own series.

I had written DARK ROAD not just to describe Zack Tolliver’s first assignment to Navajo Land after Quantico and his first meeting with Eagle Feather and Jimmy Chaparral but also as a new mystery in itself. In that sense one might say it was in reality my seventh mystery novel. Thus, to follow Zack’s career one would read it first in the series, but if following this author’s skill development, one should read it seventh. Either way, I think it is a good read.

Trail Running Encounters

I love running on wilderness trails for the wildlife I chance to see. At a hiking pace, one is less likely to surprise an animal, especially not when in a group or talking or with a dog. If a wild animal sees you first, you probably won’t see it at all. Those who hike or run with pods in their ears are less likely to see wildlife, not just because the acute hearing of animals can often detect the sound, but you may not hear the sound that tells you wildlife is nearby.

Many of my wildlife encounters have occurred after hearing a grunt, or rattle, or just a slight movement in the brush. I stop running then and wait and listen to see what, if anything, reveals itself. I run with a forefoot strike, a technique useful for long distances but which also tends to be quieter than a heel strike. If the wind is right, I sometimes come up on an animal before it is aware of me.

In all my years of trail running, the spring and summer of 2019 have been the most rewarding for seeing wildlife while on the trail. It may have been the abundant rainfall preceding the spring, ensuring plenty of water in most areas. For whatever reason, some animals were cooperative enough to wait for me to find my camera and take pictures.

I’ve seen several snakes either in or along the trail this year. The most impressive was the rattlesnake that stretched across the trail. It lay perfectly still, that likely being its best defense against aerial assault, hoping to be invisible or at least look like a twig. To pass, it was necessary for me to retreat and then advance again tromping loudly like a squadron of hikers. It was gone then.

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The Gopher Snake wouldn’t move either, but I felt less concern stepping around it.

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Surprisingly, the California Garter Snake didn’t move but watched me with raised head as I moved around it taking pictures.

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I saw my first mountain lion in the wild this spring. I surprised it just as it was moving out of the brush onto the dirt of the Jeep road about twenty feet in front of me. It turned its head and looked at me and I could almost read its surprise. Then it vanished. No picture opportunity there.

The family (or tribe?) of feral pigs announced their presence with grunts. I stopped and looked up the slope where I saw the brush moving. The humped back of the largest male was just visible. They were apparently feeding on something quite contentedly. As I stood listening a line of heifers crossed the Jeep road on the other side of me and angled up to where the pigs were feeding. I could hear but not see the altercation and realized the pigs were retreating down a path that would take them into the road in front of me. I had time to pull out the camera. I was the second unhappy surprise for them and they scrambled away grunting in dismay.

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Along the same road more recently a wildcat emerged from the brush onto the road in front of me, turned to look in much the same way as the mountain lion had done, then powered across and up the slope using its long rear legs vanishing into the brush. Again, no opportunity for a photo.

My latest sighting was for me the most spectacular. While descending a narrow path down a mountainside with the sun low in the west I was on the watch for snakes warming themselves with those last sunlit moments. I had startled several already. The path was carved from the slope, leaving a cut embankment about a foot or two high on my right. I became aware of motion. A gray fox stood above me on the slope about eight feet away. I had never seen one so close in the wild. His dull brown outer coat gave way to lustrous golden tan undercoat in places. His pointed ears were turned to me as he turned his pointed nose toward me.

Usually, a fox will vanish immediately but this one stood and studied me for just as long as I stood and studied him. I spoke softly and he listened. Only when I tried to extricate my camera did he start to move, not in an alarmed way––just moving on. But no picture. It was a disappointment because it would have been a once-in-a-lifetime shot. But I carry the picture in my head.

It is now deer hunting season and my runs in this particular area are on hold for a fortnight. Ironically, the last animal I viewed was a doe crossing my path moving slowly, seeming unconcerned. I wished it luck.

A Visit to the Porter Ranch

(8 minutes/Scenic Travel)

My friend and co-author Wanda Snow Porter invited me to tour her family ranch last week and my love for the valleys and mountain ranges of this Central Coast California region was revitalized (as if that needed doing). The Porter ranch is a working cattle ranch as well as a historic property, a land grant originally bestowed upon Isaac James Sparks, one time otter hunter for William Goodwin Dana.

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Dana took care of his American friends and employees and helped Isaac obtain his grant from then-governor Micheltorena. Otter hunting also helped Sparks acquire wealth with which he built the first brick mansion in Santa Barbara, where he mostly stayed, leaving the Huasna Valley grant to be enjoyed by his heirs. Sparks married María de los Remedios Josefa Antonio “Mary” Ayers [Eayres], the daughter of an unlucky sea captain and the direct descendent of Midshipman George Stewart of the well known but ill-fated HMS Bounty. Herein lies a dramatic and romantic story not to be missed in Wanda’s book “Voyages of No Return” (find it on Amazon).

But I write not about history but about today and the nature in abundance on the large ranches of Central California. The Huasna Valley stretches long the Huasna River through two Porter ranches to the tiny community of Huasna. The bucolic nature of the area is in part maintained by the Twitchell Reservoir which in a rainy season can flood as far as the Porter barn, slightly askew now from water undermining its foundation. Nothing permanent can be built in the water flood plain. But the old barn still stands, and cattle and turkeys find shade here.

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There was a proposal to drill for oil on the ranch. Oil leases would have provided additional resources for the Porter family but there were concerns raised by local residents. The fast-food chain In-N-Out Burger owns a 4,834-acre ranch three miles to the north of the proposed project and brought their considerable power to bear against the oil project and it didn’t happen.

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The beauty of the ranch and its environs have thus been preserved in a time capsule of the Sparks land grant of 1843 with the beef raising Sparks/Porter family currently maintaining an unbroken chain of ranching presence here since that time.

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Our first sighting in this magnificent river valley was a bald eagle which Wanda with her sharp eyes and long lens was able to capture. The fifteen-mile drive brought us to the ranch house, built by New Yorker Arza Porter with an un-California style peaked roof reminiscent of his former home. The interior of the home has a museum feel to it with its plank floors and many antique and original furnishings. The sunny open kitchen reminded me of my own grandparent’s home in Kansas with its wide functional table and outside access.

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We took a “backcountry” drive in the Jeep where Wanda used to ride her horse. The loop followed the eastward bend of the river before turning back south and through wooded area and grassy meadows and over steep ridges. A seasonal hunting camp is tucked away in this back acreage. There are plenty of deer, quail, and turkey.

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It was a pleasure and a privilege to drive back in history and enjoy the beauty of land virtually unchanged for centuries.

Watch for TOLLIVER TALES to return from its summer siesta in September!

Open Letter to Friends and Fans

My novel CANAAN’S SECRET, book 6 in the Zack Tolliver, FBI crime mystery series is in contention for two awards this September.

I have entered it in the annual READERS’ FAVORITE BOOK AWARD contest. It received unsolicited high praise from an editor in the editing services arm of the organization.

TopShelf Magazine staff nominated the book for entry in its 2019 TopShelf Indie Book Awards. It is entered in four categories.

Both contests are judged in September.

I believe CANAAN’S SECRET is of sufficient quality to win or place highly in these contests. It has a five star rating on Amazon and 4.46 average from 96 ratings on Goodreads.

But it has only 26 reviews on Amazon.

Amazon ratings are notoriously difficult to receive since Amazon has cracked down on rating mills and similar cheating devices (and that’s a good thing!). Reviews ideally come when the book content generates strong enough feelings in a reader to motivate the extra effort required to post one.

If you have not yet read CANAAN’S SECRET, I believe you will find it very entertaining. If you have read it, and enjoyed it more than most books, please consider posting a positive review.

The real task today for authors is to place their work before as many readers as possible. Winning or placing well in a national or international contest helps accomplish this.

Thank you.

R Lawson Gamble