Historical Fiction of Byron Grush

 Sample chapter from Across the Great Divide https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0FVZYY3T5 Chapter Twenty-five A Singed Cat is Better Than He Looks It is a lovely summer morning; one filled with great promise. The miners are looking forward to shining rewards from their dry diggings and coyote holes. Sam Grush and Howard Bicknell are off to their claim at Woodpecker Ravine south of Grass Valley; it is a new partnership. Kiba Aku is opening up the Pacific Restaurant, setting tables with plates and silverware Sam recently received from his brother back in Beverly, a good-wishes gift. Edward Elliot, the cook, is in the kitchen prepping lunch. George Kidd is with George Marsh surveying for a ditch they are building to bring water from the Yuba River to the Coyote Diggings near the town. Phoebe Kidd is visiting Mrs. Phelps at her home along the ravine. Above the hills east of the city a conspiracy of ravens is circling over a fresh deer kill, waiting for the wolf pack to have their fil...

  Across the Great Divide Get it on Amazon In 1849, two very different men journeyed to the California Gold Rush. Captain George Washington Kidd (no relation to the famous pirate) traveled by wagon train over the hazardous emigrant trails of the Great Plains. Samuel Woodberry Grush (no relation to the author) sailed with a company of like-minded men on a three-masted barque braving the dangers of an angry sea and a brutal Cape Horn. Their paths converged in the pioneering town of Nevada City, California where their story mirrored the history of an era of gold fever, struggle, boom and bust. It is a story filled with characters of the old West: grizzled mountain men, legendary bandits, beautiful divas, mysterious madams, maltreated foreign immigrants, and persecuted Indigenous Peoples. It is 98 percent true.  

  The Sound of Icicles Stabbing Birds Get it on Amazon Short stories of historical fiction: some reimagined family history, some that touch on man’s inhumanity toward man (and woman), some that are significant “road trips” for the characters involved, some that expose racism and intolerance, a mirror of our heritage. A young man and a young woman find love despite diversity, and experience intolerance close to home. Two brothers emigrate from Sweden to start a new life, but both love the same woman. A soldier returning from the war to end all wars finds renewed conflict. A man’s life begins and ends with a pushcart, love is lost. Ghastly murders prompt later investigation of the supernatural. Going to the gold rush involves an argonaut in the Indian problem. An epic road trip has dire consequences. A young white girl wants to help with the Civil Rights Movement and has a baptism of fire. Included are poems written by the author’s wife as a memorial to a lost muse.