Stephen Holt (1) (1894–1987)

The year was 1848 and "Gold!" was the cry that echoed out of the California Sierras to spread like wildfire across the nation and around the world.

Many an eager, would-be prospector faced a long and dangerous trip around the Horn or across the Central American swamps to California. But luckily for fourteen-year-old Carlos Rivera, the gold fields lay almost at the boundaries of his mother's ranch. That was why he, his twin sister, Carlotta, and Mamacita were among the earliest to head for show more John Sutter's mill up on the American River, where the gold had first been discovered.

For Carlos and his greenhorn partner, John Steyer, the months that followed were filled with discouragement and danger, as they staked their claims and panned for gold all the way from Bidwell's sandbar on Feather River to Stoddard's Lake of Gold without a strike. Indeed, Carlos' tame crow Screamer seemed right when he cawed, "Gold, gold! It's murder!"

Then came the day when a shaft of light reflected a blinding streak of gold—and another forty-niner had hit pay-dirt! Yet it was Carlotta back on American River who held the reins to the biggest surprise of all. show less

Great old-fashioned Western-style coming of age novel. A young cowboy sets off to fulfill his dream of becoming a vet. Hitchhiking across Canada, he rescues a mangy, injured, outlaw roan with a nasty attitude. Against the advice of his new employer, he nurses the horse back to health, and befriends him. A side story covers the issue of mange management and the government-required dousing that many ranchers attempted to avoid. The main action kicks in when the outlaw roan's former owner, a show more rodeo livestock promoter, reclaims the horse with plans to return him to his former career as a vicious outlaw bucking horse. show less

Um, pretty bad, actually. A 'kid's' book - as in, never mind making the threats/challenges realistic, let alone creating genuine reactions to them. Strawman challenges throughout - the kid is in a hurry, making a long trip by horse with a strict deadline - so he spends half a morning hanging out at one ranch and in that time solves a many-years-old mystery. Which is the deus ex machina that enables him to achieve his aim at the end...bleah. So why didn't the guy say something at the time? show more Why make the kid go compete (and, of course, win) in the rodeo, if he was gonna give him the horse anyway? Bleah and bleah. Nice atmosphere and description, but the plot ran on rails, never mind reality. The blatant stereotyping was merely a fillip of annoyance on top of that (sneaky, cheating Mexican, surly Indian whose every other word was 'Ugh!'...hmmmph. OK, of the times, but still.) show less

Ugh. Amazingly stupid book. The characters are pleasant, if shallow, but make pretty uniformly stupid decisions. Our Hero (well trained by his foster parents, who do the same thing) tends towards formulating the problem, then sitting and fretting about it until luck steps in and magically makes things right. Serious case of author on his side. Sky belongs to someone else - so Glenn stares at the brand and frets about him being taken back. And said owner comes and _steals_ him back, why? Why show more didn't Glenn tell the sheriff or the doctor or someone? Maybe that's why Balleau stole him, he assumed the kid would be smart enough to actually warn that he might take the horse. Oh, I forgot - Glenn also actually boldly does things...and then sits and frets because they were entirely the wrong thing to do. But again, luck steps in and makes things work for him. There were some interesting bits - I didn't know mange was such a big deal on the open range, interesting. I'll have to look for more information about that, in some more reliable source. But overall, so stupid as to be infuriating. Glad I read it, now I can get rid of it. show less