Sonora Crossing


Book Description

After the death of her former lover, Ed Jeski, Tucson investigator Del Shannon is hesitant to take on the case of a missing child. But six-year-old Aurea Lara is rumored to possess prophetic visions, and Del discovers she may know something about Jeski's death. Plunging across the Mexican border, Del joins forces with La Banda, a group fighting to infiltrate the compound of Aurea's violent drug-lord uncle. Desert shootouts and cruel betrayals make Del question whether Aurea's dark visions might just be coming true. Praise: "Del Shannon is a character you'd like to continue to follow. She's smart, sexy, tough and adventurous—a female P.I. who doesn't depend on men. And James has her engaged in situations with some interesting psychological implications."—Tucson Weekly "Darrell James demonstrates many skills in his well-crafted second novel, Sonora Crossing. The descriptive writing of place is good. The characters are well drawn, even if they aren't particularly complex. Most of all, James manages a fast plot well. This plot-driven book keeps the reader turning the pages to find out what happens next."—U-T San Diego "James surrounds the passionate and determined Del, who comfortably occupies center stage, with plenty of interesting characters and a plot to severely test her will and ingenuity."—Publishers Weekly "This is a truly exciting plot which makes for a great read. Del is a very strong and competent main character that lovers of suspense, western, and mystery books will absolutely enjoy!"—Suspense Magazine A finalist for The Rocky Award for best mystery novel set in the Left Coast Crime Geographical Region




Sonora Crossing


Book Description

When six-year-old Aurea Lara who is rumored to have prophetic visions is kidnapped, Tuscon investigator Del Shannon takes the case, encountering vigilantes fighting the Mexican drug-trafficker responsible.




Sierra Crossing


Book Description

A critical era in California's history and development—the building of the first roads over the Sierra Nevada—is thoroughly and colorfully documented in Thomas Howard's fascinating book. During California's first two decades of statehood (1850-1870), the state was separated from the east coast by a sea journey of at least six weeks. Although Californians expected to be connected with the other states by railroad soon after the 1849 Gold Rush, almost twenty years elapsed before this occurred. Meanwhile, various overland road ventures were launched by "emigrants," former gold miners, state government officials, the War Department, the Interior Department, local politicians, town businessmen, stagecoach operators, and other entrepreneurs whose alliances with one another were constantly shifting. The broad landscape of international affairs is also a part of Howard's story. Constructing roads and accumulating geographic information in the Sierra Nevada reflected Washington's interest in securing the vast western territories formerly held by others. In a remarkably short time the Sierra was transformed by vigorous exploration, road-promotion, and road-building. Ox-drawn wagons gave way to stagecoaches able to provide service as fine as any in the country. Howard effectively uses diaries, letters, newspaper stories, and official reports to recreate the human struggle and excitement involved in building the first trans-Sierra roads. Some of those roads have become modern highways used by thousands every day, while others are now only dim traces in the lonely backcountry.




Sonora


Book Description

This informal account of the people, culture, land, and history of Sonora, Mexico, is now available in paperback.







Vegetation and Flora of the Sonoran Desert


Book Description

A Stanford University Press classic.




The Quiet Mountains


Book Description

Readers who believe as Herman Melville's Ishmael, that "meditation and water are wedded for ever," will be entranced by Rex Johnson, Jr.'s, account of his travels to the upper Bavispe River in Mexico's northern Sierra Madre. Combining travel observations, natural history, ethnography, ecology, and ichthyology, Johnson's narrative plunges the reader into a world that is so far from the twenty-first-century United States that it is difficult to believe how physically close the two countries actually are. Johnson goes in search of an ancient species of trout, the Bavispe, at least 3 million years old. It has been easier for the Bavispe to remain unchanged for millennia than for the human inhabitants of the Sierra Madre to endure for mere centuries. Johnson notes the area's Indian descendants are in the process of becoming modern, and the needs of the ancient trout, dependent on pure, unpolluted water, collide at times with the choices of people scratching out an existence in a challenging environment. The parallel stories from natural and human history are a central theme in Johnson's account of environmental change and its consequences, layered with the personal, contemplative meaning he finds in the quest for the seldom-seen fish.







Six Plays


Book Description




Wings in the Desert


Book Description

There is a common but often unspoken arrogance on the part of outside observers that folk science and traditional knowledge—the type developed by Native communities and tribal groups—is inferior to the “formal science” practiced by Westerners. In this lucidly written and humanistic account of the O’odham tribes of Arizona and Northwest Mexico, ethnobiologist Amadeo M. Rea exposes the limitations of this assumption by exploring the rich ornithology that these tribes have generated about the birds that are native to their region. He shows how these peoples’ observational knowledge provides insights into the behaviors, mating habits, migratory patterns, and distribution of local bird species, and he uncovers the various ways that this knowledge is incorporated into the communities’ traditions and esoteric belief systems. Drawing on more than four decades of field and textual research along with hundreds of interviews with tribe members, Rea identifies how birds are incorporated, both symbolically and practically, into Piman legends, songs, art, religion, and ceremonies. Through highly detailed descriptions and accounts loaded with Native voice, this book is the definitive study of folk ornithology. It also provides valuable data for scholars of linguistics and North American Native studies, and it makes a significant contribution to our understanding of how humans make sense of their world. It will be of interest to historians of science, anthropologists, and scholars of indigenous cultures and folk taxonomy.