Into the Unknown: Adventure on the Spanish Colonial Frontier (Wild West Collection, V. 7)

Until now, the compelling stories in Arizona Highways' Wild West Collection have centered on American adventures, outlaws, and pioneers scrambling to realize their manifest destiny in the 19th and 20th centuries. In Into the Unknown, readers will discover a cast of Spanish-speaking characters who lived in an earlier era, when the land that was to become the Wild West made up the northern frontier of New Spain.

Seasoned writer Susan Hazen-Hammond confesses that her fascination with Spanish colonial history began when she "came across Diego Perez de Luxan's journal of the Espejo Expedition in 1582-83 into what is now Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas.

"I started reading and couldn't stop, as simple, powerful sentences re-created the world the explorers found themselves in . . . . long before the United States came into existence, many of the elements we associate with the Wild West already were present.

"Pioneers wrestled with the land and themselves. They fought off Apaches. They didn't pretend to be saints; they gambled, swore, shot their friends, and engaged in tempestuous affairs. . . . (They) set the pattern of rugged individualism, raw courage, inventiveness, and the ability to survive seemingly impossible circumstances that have characterized the West ever since.

"Some people couldn't wait to get here. Others couldn't leave fast enough. But through the Centuries, those who reached the northern frontier of New Spain shared this bond: They lived and died, lured -- and sometimes driven -- by the power and appeal of the unknown."

Into the Unknown is the seventh volume in the Wild West Collection. Earlier releases in the popular series include "Days of Destiny," "Manhunts and Massacres," "They Left Their Mark," "The Law of the Gun," "Tombstone Chronicles," and "Stalwart Women."

Susan Hazen-Hammond began researching the Spanish history of the Southwest more than 16 years ago while working on her first piece for Arizona Highways, a profile of explorer Antonio de Espejo. Since then, she has written repeatdly about the Spanish Colonial era for Arizona Highways and other publications. She speaks, reads, and writes Spanish, and has traveled extensively in the Spanish speaking world. Her writings have appeared widely throughout Latin America in the popular Spanish magazine, Selecciones, won the Primer Premio Nacional de Periodismo (National First Prize in Journalism) for humanitarian journalism, awarded by the prestigious Club de Periodistas de Mexico in 1995. Her poetry in Spanish appears in the quarterly, La Herencia del Norte. She is the author of eight other books, including two history books: "Timelines of Native American History" (Berkley, Paperback Book Club), and "A Short History of Santa Fe" (Lexikos, 1988).