Westbound
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5.0 • 1 Rating
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- $7.99
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
For fifteen years, retired newspaper editor Elliott Madison worked on a book about his great-grandfather's terrifying voyage around Cape Horn and his great-grandmother's tragic journey on the California Trail, the homestead they developed into a prosperous ranch in Mendocino County. Now, in the waning hours of his life, he recalls the day he was contacted by a woman from New York City named Phoebe Crighton, who claims a distant relative was employed as a hired hand on his family's ranch. Elliott is perfectly willing to believe that might be true, but when Ms. Crighton abruptly flies out to San Francisco to meet him, he is at once stunned and appalled by her insistence that this relative, a former Civil War infantryman, and his great-grandmother were lovers. Reluctantly, he agrees to drive Ms. Crighton up to Anderson Valley to see what they can learn about the intersecting arcs of their ancestors' lives – never imagining this spur-of-the-moment journey into the past will change his own life forever.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Connor's wistful multigenerational saga (after Dying Words), a downhearted patriarch delves into stories of an ancestor. In San Francisco, elderly divorcé Elliot Madison lives with his granddaughter Alissa, 23, whom he raised since she was a teen after his daughter's divorce. Now Elliot grumps about the rebellious Alissa's partying and playing drums in a metal band called the Sores. Once the editor of the San Francisco Chronicle, Elliot spends his retirement researching and reading the journal of his adventurous great-grandfather William Henry Madison, who in 1851 left his home in Charleston, S.C., in search of gold in California (he took the sea route around Cape Horn, and his journal describes the harrowing six-month voyage). Adding intrigue to Elliot's genealogical research is a stranger, Phoebe Crighton, who claims her ancestor knew William. As Elliot begins writing a book about William, he collaborates with Phoebe on untangling the mysteries of their lineages and begrudgingly supports the Sores, ordering takeout for them and visiting their gigs. Connor teases out smart insights on his characters as they forge new identities. Here's Elliot reflecting on William: "he had also gone in search of himself, hoping to learn who he was and who he might become." Readers will delight in the lead's moving and surprising discoveries. (Self-published)
