Frazzled Family Ties and Tin Horn Justice
in the Arizona Territory
"Rochlin offers a fascinating tale of the Old West from a Jewish perspective that is not often found in books, while her expertise in early Arizona life will appeal to all western aficionados."
--Booklist, American Library Association
"Rochlin's Desert Dwellers Trilogy combines authentic details of Jewish settler life, colorful characters and...enough period charm, crackling storytelling and priceless details to satisfy devotees of both wild west lore and Jewish history."
--Publishers Weekly
"Frieda faces a difficult journey, harsh lawmen and a trial that tests both women's ingenuity and strength. Rochlin's in-depth research offers a vivid, compelling picture of life in 1880s' Arizona."
--Edith Broida, Book Club Facilitator, Farmington Hills, Michigan
Frieda Goldson and her husband Bennie live in Dos Cacahuates, on the Arizona-Sonora border. Frieda is about to give birth to their third child when they receive the news that Frieda's fourteen-year-old sister, Ida, has been kidnapped by a surly murderer named Jed Pearson, somewhere in the wilds of the territory. Frieda hires the services of a garrulous, greedy sheriff, who hunts down the murderer and brings him, and the captive Ida, to justice.
Frieda hurries to Nogales to settle with the sheriff and bring her sister back to Dos Cacahuates, but is dismayed to learn that Ida has fallen under the spell of the tight-lipped Pearson, and is carrying his child. Ida is now considered an accomplice to Pearson's bloody murders, and the scene shifts to Prescott, where the couple are tried in a tense courtroom drama.
On Her Way Home, the third novel in Harriet Rochlin's acclaimed Desert Dwellers Trilogy, is good-hearted, action-packed, and full of the rugged frontier spirit of Arizona in the 1880s. Told from the viewpoint of a strong-minded young Jewish woman, this "western" has a cast of fresh and believable pioneer characters--women, Jews, Mexicans, Chinese, Papagos, and Anglos from many segments of American society, from horse-traders and mule-drivers to pompous politicians.
Harriet Rochlin, a lifelong resident of Los Angeles, has been researching, writing, and lecturing on Jewish roots in the West for twenty-five years. Her landmark social history, Pioneer Jews: A New Life in the Far West (Houghton Mifflin), in print for sixteen years, was recently released in an updated edition. The first two volumes of the Desert Dwellers Trilogy, The Reformer's Apprentice and The First Lady of Dos Cacahuates, were published by Fithian Press.
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