National award winning western and historical novelist Gary McCarthy brings together the cast from two of his most popular and long running series – The Horsemen and The Derby Man. Several years have passed since Ruff, Dixie and Houston Ballou fled Civil War-ravaged Tennessee with two of their great thoroughbred stallions and a handful of mares. The displaced Ballou family has been looking for a place to build a horse ranch and racetrack when a series of events take them to the beautiful Prescott Valley, home of Fort Whipple and Arizona’s new Territorial capital. In a blinding snowstorm, Darby Buckingham is racing from Santa Fe to Prescott in order to help his longtime love, Miss Dolly. Almost at his destination he helplessly rages at his drunken stagecoach driver to slow down, but the coach overturns and leaves him in desperate circumstances until the Ballou riders and their thoroughbreds appear. And so begins a friendship and adventure in Prescott that will change the lives of these famous characters.
Author
Gary McCarthy is the author of fourteen American historical novels and thirty-four westerns published by many of New York's major publishing houses. He has over three million books in print and continues to research and write his Canyon Country novels. Growing up with horses and living in California, Nevada and Arizona, Gary is well suited to writing about the American West. He received his B.S. degree in Animal Science and an M.S. in Agricultural Economics. He has a keen interest in Native American cultures, especially the Hopi, Navajo, Havasupai and Haulapai who live in Northern Arizona. Gary and his wife Jane live in Arizona and have often ridden horses and hiked in the Kaibab and Coconino National Forests. Gary is always looking for new stories set in the American West and considers the research to be among his most favorite pursuits.
