Sun Mountain

This majestic historical novel takes the form of a memoir. The narrator, Henry Stoddard, is drawn to fabulous Virginia City, Nevada, where he becomes a reporter on the fabled newspaper, The Territorial Enterprise. Among his colleagues is another young man, Sam Clemens, just starting to use his pseudonym, Mark Twain. Stoddard finds his destiny in the hectic life of the mining town, where the incredible Comstock Lode pours a fortune in silver ore into eager hands.

The author vividly depicts the passions and greed of the bonanza town, its sorrows, its dangers, the menace of deep mines, the humor and practical jokes that were part of daily life there. He portrays a harsh and ugly town, cruel and oddly beautiful, mean and oddly tender. In the end, Stoddard leaves journalism behind, becomes a mining manager in far-flung locales, only to return in his old age to the city that shaped him and gave him an extraordinary life.

"Dick Wheeler must be western literature's most knowledgeable authority on boom towns. No one can quite equal his ability to evoke the feel of grit from dirt streets on one's face...and the sounds of loud revelry of drunken miners loose on the town.... Wheeler recounts the history of Virginia City from its rude beginnings to its decline, writing in a mostly humorous style by interspersing the comedy with poignant scenes that touch the heart and leave one feeling that good kind of sadness that only great writers can evoke." ?Amarillo Globe-News