Stripping a Book by Paty Jager

Fossil, Oregon

The rights to my third book in the Letters of Fate series were reverted back to me. I was excited because it was my favorite book in the series. The hero, Isaac Corum, and the heroine, Alamayda Wagner, are like oil and water when they first meet. But Isaac's protectiveness and her independent nature brings them together.

The stipulations for being able to republish this book, as it was in a Kindle World -which meant I had incorporated another author's characters and settings into my book- were to strip my story of the setting and characters from the other world.

Since my book was set at a mining town, I picked a real mining area in my home state to set the story. All I had to do was change setting names add the businesses and close towns to the story and change the names and in some cases the gender of the characters who were from the Kindle World. And since I hadn't kept my characters in that other authors world for more than a third of the book, the switching was easy.

Cornucopia 1884

Cornucopia, the mining area I used for my book has some interesting statistics:

The Cornucopia Mine group located 12 miles west of Halfway Oregon in the Wallowa Whitman National Forest was once one of the 6 largest gold mines in the United States. It ran the longest continually of any mine in Oregon. It had 36 miles of tunnels with a depth of 3,000 feet.

It’s believed the mines output was $20 million from gold, silver, lead, and copper.

The mining area began when Lon Simmons one of the first to discover gold in the early 1880’s. It’s said he hadn’t planted the first stake of his section before men were all over the side of the mountain looking for gold.

There were many small mines in the area. The Cornucopia Mine group was made up of Union-Companion Mine(the biggest), Last Chance, Queen of the West and Red Jacket.

Last Chance was a pocket mine. Meaning it was a dense accumulation of ore that was under the surface and down to the bedrock and perhaps in the bedrock. While the other mines were dredged and drilled.

Union-Companion produced the most and was said to be on the mother lode. This means it was located on a vein of the ore it produced.

The mines were so remote they used outdated equipment and methods to extract the ore. Only horses and wagons were used for transportation. The first few years were a slow process of not only getting the ore out of the ground but also delivering it to a railroad station. Baker City was the closest and it was a 3 day trip.

Isaac makes this 3 day trip hoping to give Alamayda her father's things and send her back to where she came from. Unfortunately, she is on a mission that she doesn't reveal at first and she has no intention of going home. Ever.

Isaac: Letters of Fate

Historical western filled with steamy romance and the rawness of a growing country.

Alamayda Wagner’s life has left her cynical, but also vigilant, and that’s what propels her to Cornucopia, Oregon to uncover the secrets her father took to his grave. She quickly discovers her only hope includes trusting Isaac. That soon proves to be expensive, and not just financially.

The last thing Isaac Corum needs or wants is a snooty woman telling him he didn’t do enough to save her father, which is what her letter implied. He’d helped the man more than most people would have, and swears he won’t go out of his way like that again. He’ll meet her at the Baker City train station, deliver her father’s belongings, and send her back the way she came.

Universal buy link: https://www.books2read.com/u/mVBAjl

 Paty Jager is an award-winning author of 32 novels, 8 novellas, and numerous anthologies of murder mystery and western romance. All her work has Western or Native American elements in them along with hints of humor and engaging characters.This is what readers have to say about the Letters of Fate series- “...filled with romance, adventure and twists and turns.” “What a refreshing and well written love story of fate and hope!”

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