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Pierce Family Saga
Category:
Historical Fiction
Publisher: Create Space
ISBN-10: 1517038251
Type: Fiction
Pages: 305
Copyright: October, 2015
ISBN-13: 9781517038250
Price: $3.99 (eBook)
In Kansas Territory, 1855, runaway Cordelia Pierce, age 13, travels 150 miles down the Kansas River to Westport, Missouri, seeking help for her dying mother.
A brutal stepfather . . . A dying mother. . . A loving daughter who tries to save her Kansas Territory, 1855 In this coming-of-age story, thirteen-year-old Cordelia endures her stepfather's abuse until she learns her ailing mother is pregnant again. Fearing her mother will die in childbirth, she runs away, heading for Westport and her aunt, the only person who might be able to save her mother. She disguises herself as a boy and sets out on foot to make the 150-mile trip. Following the Kansas River, she hitches rides with a variety of travelers going east, facing setbacks along the way while learning lessons about the world and her place in it. Cordelia's Journey is the first book in the Pierce Family Saga, a series of historical novels that follow Cordelia and her family through the latter half of the nineteenth century.
Excerpt
Excerpt from Cordelia's Journey by Hazel Hart
The smell of bacon and corn meal mush frying woke me. I stretched and squinted at the horizon where the faintest light blue separated the earth and the darkness.
"Time to eat," Marlon announced. "I want to get past Lawrence with no trouble. It seems like there's always flare-ups between the proslavery and free-state crowds."
I pushed my poncho off and rolled it up. "When Miz Wilma left her wagon with me and Jesse Haskell to go help his pa, we ran into some slave hunters." While I filled my plate, I relayed the story of Stinky the skunk, and we all had a good laugh.
"You were lucky," Marlon said. "From what I heard at Ft. Riley, the blacksmith and his family at Hidden Springs didn't fare so well."
I put my fork down and stared at him. "Hidden Springs? What happened?"
Marlon told his story with the same gusto I had used to tell about Stinky. "The bounty hunters were after a runaway slave, a young boy, and they'd heard the blacksmith was a free-stater. They went to his house and ransacked it on the idea the family must be hiding the runaway. Scared his wife and daughters. When the ruffians didn't find the kid, they headed to town and caught the blacksmith working on a horseshoe. Beat the hell out of him and branded him on the chest with the hot metal."
While Marlon shoveled in another forkful of fried mush, my heart pounded triple time. "What about the wife and girls? Were they hurt?"
Marlon must have heard the anxiety in my voice because he studied my face. "Just scared senseless," he said. "And the whole inside of the cabin was wrecked, but neighbors came to help, so I reckon they're okay." He raised an eyebrow. "You know these folks?"
"No," I lied, relieved that Ma and my sisters were okay, "but maybe the men were the same ones I met on the trail. They acted like they could do those things."
"Well, eat up. Like I said, I want to get beyond Lawrence. Trouble can happen anywhere, but there's no sense hanging around where it does."
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