Dream Helper: A Novel of Early California (THE CHRONICLES OF CALIFORNIA) - Softcover

Thompson, Willard

3.92

13 ratings by Goodreads

9780979755255: Dream Helper: A Novel of Early California (THE CHRONICLES OF CALIFORNIA)

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0979755255 ISBN 13: 9780979755255

Publisher: Rincon Publishing, 2012

View all copies of this ISBN edition:

Winner of a gold medal from the Independent Publishers Book Awards as the Best Fiction in the Western Pacific Region in 2009, and a finalist in the Eric Hoffer National Book Awards, Dream Helper tells the story of an Indian woman's struggles to preserve her way of life and family at the Franciscan mission of Santa Barbara. California.Set against a background of California in the early years of the 19th Century, A young Chumash Indian woman, Cayatu, flees to the Santa Barbara Mission to escape the threats of the village shaman only to find she is a prisoner, unable to leave the mission after she is baptized a Christian. When she is told by a mission priest she will be locked up each evening in a new women's quarters she tries to flee only to be found by one of the Spanish soldiers at the fort who tries to return her to the mission.What happens after that begins a bittersweet tale of Cayatu's sturggle to preserve her family and way of life.In fictional form, Dream Helper tells the true story of the Franciscan mission system in early California, a system vastly different than the free life the Chumash people had led before the coming of the Spaniards. The two cultures clashed and Cayatu finds herself caught in the middle.The Midwest Book Review called Dream Helper, "A captivating novel from first page to last. ... "Dream Helper: A Novel of Early California" is a captivating novel from first page to last and a must for historical fiction enthusiasts with an interest in the old west.

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

From the Inside Flap:

When Cayatu, a beautiful, young Chumash Indian woman begs protection from the Franciscan priests at Mission Santa Barbara she's forced to live a captive life, with only the love of a Chumash man and the friendship of a Mexican woman to sustain her. While the Spanish priests and soldiers fight among themselves for power, land, and the souls of the Chumash, Cayatu fights to preserve her old way of life.

Against a backdrop of romance and intrigue in Santa Barbara's early mission days, Dream Helper tells of the clash between the Christianizing zeal of the Spaniards and the idyllic, spirit-driven world of the fiercely proud Chumash Indians.

About the Author:

ABOUT THE AUTHOR WILLARD THOMPSON Dream Helper is the first in Willard Thompson's Chronicles of California series of historical novels. Thompson is an award-winning writer, lecturer and historian living in Montecito, California. Delfina’s Gold, the second in the series was published in 2011 and the third novel, Diego’s War will be published in 2013 Thompson was awarded The Sara Miller McCune Award by the John E. Profant Foundation for the Arts to write Dream Helper, which also won an award as a work in progress at the Santa Barbara Writers' Conference. In 2008 He won a Santa Barbara Writers Conference Community of Voices Scholarship. His short story, Valentine's Day, was awarded a prize at the East of Eden Writer's Conference. In addition to historical literary fiction, Willard Thompson also writes non-fiction. Recently published articles are: Walter Vail — Empire Builder, Published in Persimmon Hill Magazine; The Last Cattle Drive, published in Range Magazine; Dividing the Waters, a brief history of Western water woes and the role John Wesley Powell played in the development of the West, also in Range Magazine. Running the Big Ditch, an account of a go-fer's life on a commercial raft running the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon, published in Westways Magazine and Forbidden Fruit, an account of three days on the El Paso border working with the Border Patrol to intercept smugglers. Thompson's manuscript, Montecito Adobes and the Settlers who built Them was published by the Santa Barbara Historical Museum in 2008. Thompson also lectures, regularly on historic subjects about his adopted state, California. He is vice president and a docent at the Santa Barbara Maritime Museum, a docent at the Santa Barbara Historical Museum, and Arroyo Hondo Land Preserve in Santa Barbara County. He is a graduate of Colgate University in Hamilton, NY.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.