Tiger's Woman

x, 590 pp. 8vo. "A love story as deep and primal as the waters and forests of the Pacific Northwest that form its setting, here is the new novel by the author of the acclaimed and beloved The Proud Breed -- a compelling story that sweeps from San Francisco's Barbary Coast to still-frontier Seattle and beyond to the majestic San Juan Islands, where, hidden from the past and a curious world, a hesitant, hard-won love would flower. She called herself Mary Smith and concealed her extraordinary beauty -- a beacon to all who would follow - behind widow's weeds. She came to San Francisco in flight from a secret so shattering, a man so dangerous, that no disguise could shield her for long. Then she met Jason Drake -- The Tiger -- a lover, gambler, empire builder, and found sanctuary in a cold bargain. She would be The Tiger's woman in return for his protection so long as he asked no questions about her past. Here was a man at once strong and yet vulnerable, who bore fierce pain and never cried out, whose very being hungered for love but who would not risk reaching out for it -- not from his small son, not from Mary. A man who would not ask for trust, but instead would take her to a private place where, slowly, she could learn to be free. Free enough to love. Free enough to offer her true name. There, on Drake's Island, the woman who called herself Mary would find a new life. There a tenuous love would grow between The Tiger and his woman -- until the past caught them both to send the world into flame, to test the strength and timbre of a special love. Rich in historical detail, alive with finely drawn, memorable characters, The Tiger's Woman is storytelling at its peak, a magnificent saga of the Pacific Northwest in the years following the Civil War, a splendid evocation of the depths and moods of love -- and of its power to transcend even the soul-shattering passions of a terrible past. Celeste de Blasis is the author of The Night Child, Suffer a Sea Change, and The Proud Breed. A native Californian, she lives on the high Mojave Desert."