Fortune's Price: A Gold Rush Odyssey

Maxy Awards 2025 Runner-Up: Historical & Adventure

"Fortune's Call is superbly written. Great contrast in characters, and the historical detail is incredible. Great authenticity. Once you start reading, I dare you to put it down!" -James Robert Daniels, author of The Comanche Kid and Jane Fury

Pegg, 14, yearned for adventure. He and his father left their family on a hardscrabble farm in Vermont to chase a desperate dream. After his dad died of fever on the high plains, Pegg's confident world fell apart. He found himself saddled with their partner, Fred Hoyt, who proved worse than useless.

Now, it is up to Pegg to keep his father's dream alive. But California in the 1850's is a raw, lawless place, full of constant danger. Subsisting largely on hope, Pegg battles wild rivers, savage beasts, floods and fires. Even when the American River yields the gold that will allow Pegg to return home in triumph, Hoyt's addiction to trouble threatens not only Pegg's success, but their very lives. Can the boy who trusts too much keep his duplicitous partner from driving them to ruin?