The caretaker of the mission's bells plans to ring them to usher in a new era for the town, but will he be commemorating death, marriage, emergency . . . or perhaps all three? Personal tragedies, schemes for terror and profit, and the threat of revolution spilling over from Mexico combine to set the stage for San Juan's long-overdue transformations.

Author Biography

Jackson Gregory (1882 - 1943) was an American teacher, journalist, and writer. Jackson was born in Salinas, California, the son of Monterey county attorney Durrell Stokes Gregory (1825 - 1889) and Amelia (Hartnell) and was educated at the University of California, Berkeley, earning a B.L. in 1906. Jackson began his career as a newspaper reporter in San Francisco. He later served as a principal at a high school in Truckee, where he met his future wife, Lotus McGlashan. They were wed December 20, 1910 and the couple would have two sons. Jackson then became a journalist, working in Illinois, Texas, and New York. When their first son was born in 1917, the family settled in Auburn, California, where Jackson became a prolific writer of western and detective stories. Fifteen years later the couple moved to Pasadena, where they were divorced. Jackson then moved in with his brother Edward, who was living in Auburn. He died there June 12, 1943, while working on a novel titled The Hermit of Thunder King. Jackson Gregory authored more than 40 fiction novels and a number of short stories. Several of his tales were used as the basis of films released between 1916 and 1944, including The Man from Painted Post (1917).