Mythmaker Series The American Old West usually conjures up images of lean and hungry men fighting for survival. Yet the women of the West faced equally difficult challenges. One such heroic woman is Elizabeth McFarland, known to her adopted Native American tribe as ... Mythmaker. The Mythmaker series chronicles the tragic path of the Kiowa from the signing of the Treaty at Medicine Lodge to the reservation. I've always said that history is written by the winners. In this series, I wanted history to be seen through the eyes of those who lost the most - the Native Americans. Chronicled by a woman who understood what was happening to the Kiowa and their way of life as it disintegrated with the onslaught of westward expansion, this series chronicles her years of love and respect for the People. The Trail to Medicine Lodge Elizabeth McFarland, daughter of an Army colonel stationed at Fort Larned, Kansas, has been captured by the Kiowa. Her brother, Noble, and his half-Comanche best friend, Johnny Two Hats, set out to rescue her. None of their lives will ever be the same. Seeking information about Beth's capture, Johnny returns to his mother's tribe only to rediscover the importance of his heritage. Torn between the tribe and Noble, his blood brother, Johnny must ultimately decide where his deepest loyalty lies. Noble's search is bittersweet, bringing heartbreak and a surprising kind of love. He vows to keep looking for Beth, despite his own personal sacrifice. Beth's sheer determination turns mere survival into unexpected triumph. But will she turn her back on her family forever, or will she relinquish a role in the tribe that transcends anything that she could hope to be in the white man's world? The Trail to Medicine Lodge is the first book in the series. To buy this book, click here. The Trail of Mythmaker In Tracy Dunham's last book, The Trail to Medicine Lodge, Elizabeth McFarland survived capture by the Kiowa and became a healer known to her clan as Mythmaker. In The Trail of Mythmaker, Elizabeth's story continues. In the wake of the ill-conceived Medicine Lodge Treaty, the tribes battle for survival Elizabeth and Johnny Two Hats, her half-Comanche husband, join the struggle to save a dying way of life even as they despair over the future of their people. Then Johnny Two Hats is wrongly arrested for participating in a massacre of seven men, and Elizabeth is forced to return to the white world in order to seek help in freeing him. She writes a record of her experience, and through this chronicle it becomes very clear that Elizabeth McFarland has earned the name of Mythmaker. The Trail of Mythmaker is the second book in the series. To buy this book, click here. The Long Trail Home Along with her half-Comanche husband, Johnny Two Hats, the white woman born Elizabeth McFarland, named Mythmaker by the Kiowa, sets out to find her adopted Indian family. The decimation of the buffalo is complete, and the tribes are reduced to farming arid land on the reservation. Instead of finding a home with their People, Mythmaker and Johnny Two Hats discover their tribes are starving and many friends are dead. The Kiowa and Comanche are divided between those who would cling to the old ways, and those who would take their people into the white man's world. As Mythmaker searches for a way out, Johnny is drawn to a Kiowa prophet who promises the return of the buffalo. Skeptical and at odds with her husband over their future, Mythmaker must make a choice. The Long Trail Home is the third book in the series. To buy this book, click here. The Ghost Trail As a Paiute Messiah arises in Nevada, the tribes of the Central Plains are all too eager to hear and accept his message. And what a message it is - that the earth will shift to swallow up the white people, that the Indian dead will arise and walk their native lands again, and with them, the cherished buffalo. This new religion is called the Ghost Dance. Mythmaker, born Elizabeth McFarland, fears the army will use violence to quell this messianic tide. She and her half-Comanche husband once again plunge into reservation life and its despair in an effort to stop the army. Mythmaker's foster son, Magpie, has also come home to the reservation. Christened Peter Donaldson, he is reunited with Mythmaker. He joins her and Johnny in their trek to find the Ghost Dance. The Ghost Trail story is one of hope seized and lost, of ghosts sought and not found, of finding a place in the shifting times for the Kiowa during the turbulent days leading up to the Battle of Wounded Knee. The Ghost Trail is the fourth book in the series. To buy this book, click here. The Changing Trail Heading east, Mythmaker swerves toward Larned, Kansas, to find her estranged brother. She, her son Whistle, and the Monroes, find themselves endangered by a wounded outlaw being chased by vigilantes. Left behind to tend the farm, Mythmaker's husband, Johnny, also heads for Larned to see if his friendship with Noble can be revived. A third person is adrift in Kansas - Hunter Peck, the half-Indian, half-black who saved Mythmaker's adopted son, Peter Donaldson. Found half frozen and severely frostbitten in a horse carcass by some Kansa, he is carried to Larned by the tribe. Noble's wife, Rebecca, undertakes Peck's nursing care. More than that, she urges Noble to heal his rift with his sister. Brought together in Larned, all of them reforge bonds they'd thought irrevocably broken. The Changing Trail is the fifth book in the series. To buy this book, click here. The Eureka Trail The whites, who've swarmed into the West, have turned into a marauding band of claim jumpers and thieves. The blacks, who've gone west to settle there and raise their own towns, are attacked at gun point by these same whites. The Indians, who know the land can never be owned, are fighting a losing battle to hang on to what the government promised them. Mythmaker and John Two Hats have settled down to raise horses. Hunter Peck has found a home in the black township, Eureka, and hopes for a family of his own. Hannah, Harry, and their adopted son, Feather, are on their way to help Mythmaker deliver her second child. They are not only swept into the Two Hats fight to keep their ranch, but also the catastrophe in Eureka. Who will survive the violent eruptions of the West as the nation grows? The Eureka Trail is the sixth book in the series. To buy this book, click here.

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