Gold Mountain: A Klondike Mystery
Delany’s Gold Mountain is an excellent reminder that gold rush fever wasn’t confined to California. Savvy bar owner Fiona MacGillivray takes advantage of the Klondike gold rush in the Yukon in the late 1890s. Operating a dance hall in Dawson City with fellow Scottish expatriate Ray Walker, Fiona is intent on making a good life for herself and her son Angus. Paul Sheridan, a gangster’s sidekick, would like to be part of that life—minus Angus. He’s got a map to the sounds-too-good-to-be-true Gold Mountain and is determined to take Fiona there and make his fortune from the gold that covers the ground.
Much of the book focuses on Sheridan’s kidnapping of Fiona with Angus and Mountie Richard Sterling in hot pursuit. Sheridan is no match for Fiona’s quick thinking, so her fate isn’t an issue. What’s more interesting is her past, some of which she reveals to the reader on her journey, leaving enough out that I know there has to be more (Gold Fever and Gold Digger are the first two in the series). Delany is a vivid storyteller. I could see the mud streets of Dawson City and the avaricious glint in the eyes of those stricken with gold fever.
