It’s a terrifying thing to go to war when you’re just seventeen... and even harder if you’re a girl and your job is to take photographs of men shooting and killing one another. Allie sets off to the bloody fields of the Civil War, and soon learns that it's often hard to tell the difference between friends and enemies.
Velda Brotherton enjoyed a long and accomplished career in historical writing, both fiction and nonfiction. Her love of the West and its stories drove the publication of more than twenty-five books across three decades.
Before turning to fiction, she worked as a journalist in Northwest Arkansas, a role that shaped her sharp eye for detail and deep respect for real places and real people. In 1988, she co-founded the Northwest Arkansas Writers Workshop with her friend and writing partner, the legendary Dusty Richards. The group became a cornerstone for regional writers, and Velda spent decades mentoring, teaching, and developing new talent.
Her own writing career crossed genres and publishers. She built early success as a New York–published romance author, then expanded into romantic suspense, upmarket fiction, hard-edged Westerns, and regional nonfiction that reflected her reporter’s instincts. No matter the category, her work carried the same trademarks: grit, heart, and a devotion to the history of the American West.
Velda passed away in 2023, leaving behind a diverse body of work, a loyal readership, and generations of writers whose careers she shaped. Her influence endures in the stories she told and the voices she helped bring into the world.
Where law is scarce and betrayal runs deep, courage is the only currency.
In the lawless hills of California’s gold country, survival is a daily gamble and trust is a rare commodity. Victor Garand, a weary teacher turned fortune-seeker, stumbles into the sunbaked settlement of Colinas de Oro with nothing but hope and desperation. When a chance encounter with the enigmatic Zoltan Hirsch offers him a partnership in a secret gold mine, Victor is thrust into a world of ambition, betrayal, and violence. As the mine’s riches are revealed, so too are the darker sides of human nature—greed, paranoia, and the thirst for power.
Meanwhile, Pinkerton agent Rhiann Swayze and reformed outlaw Lon Pearce chase their own redemption across the rugged frontier, only to be swept into a deadly web of kidnapping, forced labor, and rebellion. With lives hanging in the balance and justice nowhere in sight, alliances are forged and broken in the shadow of The Defiance mine.
Will courage and love be enough to overcome the brutality of men driven mad by gold? Or will the hills claim more souls before the dust settles?
Gritty, authentic, and pulse-pounding, The Defiance is a classic Western tale of survival, vengeance, and the unbreakable spirit of those who dare to stand against the odds.
An Apache Iliad is a gripping, deeply researched account of Geronimo’s final decade of war—told through the lens of one of history’s greatest epics. Award-winning historian W. Michael Farmer reveals the striking parallels between the Apache’s desperate fight for survival and Homer’s Iliad, crafting a narrative as timeless as it is tragic.
For nearly ten years, Geronimo and his warriors defied two nations, believing their mountain strongholds were as impregnable as Troy’s great walls. Like Achilles and Hector, legendary figures emerged—Geronimo, the fierce and cunning warrior; Captain Emmett Crawford, the relentless American officer; and Colonel Joaquin Terrazas, Mexico’s ruthless Apache hunter. Yet in the end, the war was not lost on the battlefield, but through deception. Just as the Trojans fell to a wooden horse filled with hidden enemies, the Apache surrendered to promises never kept, becoming prisoners of war for decades.
Across deserts, mountains, and borderlands, the true scale of the conflict becomes staggering. Five thousand American troops, three thousand Mexican soldiers, and armed civilian posses scoured two nations in pursuit of a band so small it could vanish between canyon walls—yet they never broke them. What finally ended the last Apache war wasn’t force but fraud: promises of protection, reunion, and a peaceful homeland that dissolved the moment Geronimo laid down his weapons. The result was decades of imprisonment, families scattered, and a people fighting to preserve their identity within the very system that claimed to save them.
Told through vivid, true stories supported by historic photographs and rare accounts, An Apache Iliad sheds new light on Geronimo’s fight for freedom. This is not just the story of a war—it is the story of betrayal, endurance, and the resilience of a people whose legacy still echoes through history.
Sometimes the real story begins in life’s second half.
Ani Stevenson has spent her life lifting others—always steady, always kind—but quietly wondering if she also deserves a hand to hold.
Jesse Peterson has known loss and struggle too. Years of addiction and a broken engagement left him wary of life and love, but now, clean and determined, he’s ready to discover what the world might have to offer.
A decades-old photograph, captured in a fleeting moment neither remembers, suggests a connection they can’t explain. One that refuses to fade.
When their paths cross again, past meets present, and old questions rise alongside new possibilities. Ani and Jesse are about to discover love can arrive later than expected but is more than worth the wait.
From critically-acclaimed author Lee Barber, Picture This is a tender, uplifting story about love that waits, second chances, and the quiet courage it takes to let someone truly see you.
