The Canyon of Bones

Spur Award–winner Wheeler adds this splendid 15th volume (after Fire Arrow ) to his superb Skye's West series about redoubtable mountain man Barnaby Skye. It is the late 1850s and Skye, a deserter from the Royal Navy, and his Crow Indian wife, Victoria, agree that Skye should take a second Indian wife to produce a son. Skye marries Blue Dawn, a beautiful, young Shoshone woman, and the trio is hired to guide brash English explorer and journalist Graves Duplessis Mercer to see a mysterious canyon full of dinosaur bones. Skye, happy with two wives, doesn't care much for Mercer, whose arrogance and selfishness endangers the whole party. The details of Skye's courtship and wedding are hilarious, and the fieldcraft the group must employ to survive the harsh wilderness is suspenseful and instructive. Wheeler is one of the best western authors around today. He doesn't rely on epic battles or gunfights to tell his stories, relying instead on fascinating characters, vivid imagery, subtle action and carefully drawn historical detail. (Apr.)