Vohkadeh, the young Mandan, is galloping towards a blockhouse in the Black Hills to let Martin Baumann know that the Oglala had captured his father, Bear Hunter, and plan to execute him at the next full moon. Martin, Shortleg Frank (Bear Hunter's business partner), Bob (their servant), Tubby Jemmy and Long Davy (the experienced Westerners) start off with Vohkadeh to rescue Bear Hunter. On their way Old Shatterhand, the legend of the West, and Winnetou, the chief of the Apache join the mission. The group keeps on growing as a band of the Shoshone, and a band of the Absaroka also agree to help them. On the way to the scene of the final whodunit, the beautiful Yellowstone National Park, they encounter many exciting and amusing adventures, and thus there are enough opportunities for each of them to carry out heroic deeds. This unabridged English translation retains the exciting adventures, and the strong moral conviction of May's original book, while modernising the style, and editing parts that were erroneous or may evoke bad associations. With this editing the core of May's world, the action, the dreaming of heroic deeds, and the struggle for a kind of justice have become more emphasised, and more accessible to the modern reader.

The Spanish name Llano Estacado, meaning Staked Plain, is part of the high plains of the United States, located west of today’s Lubbock, Texas. It covers an area of about 30,000 square miles, extending to the state of New Mexico. It is a strikingly flat and monotonous area at an elevation of between 3,000-4,000 feet. Local water-retaining depressions and washes that, due to the meager rainfall, rarely hold water occasionally break this semiarid plain. Sandstorms can cut down vision in the midst of day and scour the unwary with tiny bullets of sand. It is said that even Indians hesitated to cross this wasteland. Myth holds that the Coronado expedition planted stakes as guideposts for the return trip when it first crossed the plain westward, giving the area its name. Karl May has used the myth of the stakes as a backdrop for his story of ‘The Ghost of Llano Estacado’. Again, he assembles many of his Western heroes for new adventures and the performance of good deeds, in the process adding a few new characters. One of his recurring characters, Hobble-Frank, owner of the Villa “Bear Fat” in Saxony, know-it-all, mangler of half-knowledge, with his persistent and extensive elaboration’s, may have been funny a hundred years ago when read in German. However, his argumentative discourses, when translated into English, become rather tedious. They often have no meaning for the English-only reader, since they deal with local events and characters of his (and Karl May’s) home state, and mangle geography and ancient history in an attempt to be funny. At worst, they make no sense when translated. Hence, I have taken the liberty to severely edit his profuseness to make the story line flow more smoothly. Rest assured, that I have otherwise stayed as close as possible to Karl May’s writings and left even his many, many compass directions unaltered.