The Roaring Redwoods Episode 1: Escape Plans

Love, Honor, Money...and the laws we break to keep all three.


Joe Santone might bear the name of a saint, but he is nothing of the sort in his work for Boss Joe Torrio in 1920s Chicago. An assassination attempt has him re-evaluating his career choice and heading to California for a job he can tell his mother about. Helen Decker has escaped her violent home for a privileged education in New York City, but now devotion draws her back. Prohibition didn’t save her father, but maybe she can. Shaw McLendon hates the sea, but it takes a near drowning to convince him to leave Scotland and make a life in lumber instead of fish. And Mei Xing Chen can no longer hear the voices of her ancestors as she feels the pull of the ancient trees and rushing San Lorenzo River whispering her future is in America, even as her family prepares to return to China.

They all flock to where illegal booze flows freely and the parties are legendary—  to the World Famous RiverWood Lodge and Casino—  where the Pacific Ocean meets the Redwoods, gangsters meet immigrants, loggers meet movie stars—and the lines between right and wrong are obscured by the trees.  Escape Plans is the first of the 10 part series.