Nuetzel's finely crafted characters are people I would like to know. He lets us share their thoughts, fears and foibles while making them believeable and vulnerable human beings.

Fumio Kawashima
Tokyo, Japan

REVIEW

You will tear through this book in one or two sittings. Arlington Nuetzel spins a stunning narrative around the earthquakes that devastated the American Midwest in 1811 and changed the course of the Mississippi River. His colorful characters are historical as well as fictional, which adds an additional sense of authenticity to the story. Nuetzel has done considerable research into the people he portrays, and especially into the horrific events that took place. His interplay between "the good guys and the bad guys," and how their lives were destroyed or forever altered by these cataclysmic events, is a very entertaining read; and yet, an unsettling one, because the scientific community knows for a fact that this horror will definitely come again... perhaps as soon as 2027.

Reviewed by: RJM. Mesa, AZ

EXCERPT

CHAPTER XII

The young man heard the voices. He knew that he had to get off the path and so he headed straight for the river. He also knew that he could not appear at the landing. That would be the first place that they would look for him. He heard the voices receding now and he waiteduntil they were out of hearing distance before he began to set out.

Cletus Wilson raced breathlessly through the dense brush heading east, the twigs and thorns ripped at his clothing until he broke free of the woods and onto an endless field. It was blessedly
flat, in fact incredibly so but he soon became mired in occasional deposits of soft white sand, it was two and three feet deep in some
places. He chose to circle around these gummy deposits thus lengthening his route but in doing so he made far better and less
wearing progress.

He soon came to the El Camino Real some distance north of the village. He spied a dimly lit cabin by the river bank and approached it with harried stealth. He reached the wall of the cabin and carefully peered into the window. The room was unoccupied and he observed that a single oil lamp burned softly on the lone table. Just then, he heard and then felt a dog bite down hard on his ankle with extreme and vicious force. He cursed the pain and the noise for he knew that the dog’s growls and the injury to his leg could bring trouble in several unwelcome forms.

Cletus reached for a length of pipe which leaned against the cabin to his right. The dog continued to whip his leg around as it ripped his flesh with its wolf like teeth. He brought the pipe up swiftly under the dog’s jaw. It made a cracking sound and provided immediate release.

The dog took off yelping for the side yard.

There on the bank of the river he spied a small keel boat alongside a much bigger barge. Mercifully, he found that they weren’t tied
together. He checked for poles and oars, untied the bow line and slid the boat silently into the river. Settling in, he pointed the bow north and poled, keeping to the still, shallow waters by the shore. But the blood gushing from his ankle continued to flow unabated across the sodden deck.

He had made good his escape but he wondered if the posse and the townspeople would chase him upriver. They had horses and could outrun his boat handily. His thoughts turned to the lovely Sarah. She owned his heart and he wondered how or when he could ever gaze into her dewy eyes again.