Novelist & Historian | Wes Brummer | KS

Man smiling, with a background of handwriting.

Who I Am

I grew up in a small Kansas town where the

biggest yearly event wasn’t football

but the annual wheat harvest during mid-June. For

days you’d see huge trucks with tractors and

folded-up combines mounted on long

flat-beds roaring up and down Main Street.

Dust and Roses

Unlike many in 1935 Depression-era Kansas, 23-year-old,

single Sara McGurk has a comfortable life, but a trip to the

doctor reveals she is with child. The results are banishment

from home and a violent argument with her lover that leaves

her bleeding and abandoned

Stalag Sunflower

At eighteen hundred hours, we gathered without fanfare

and slogged out of camp. Not a march. Imagine trying

to march on a beach. With each step, we churned the sand,

which worked its way into our boots. The weight was not much,

but each step whittled out strength to a helpless state of fatigue.

I grew up in a small Kansas town where the biggest yearly event wasn’t football but the annual wheat harvest during mid-June. For days you’d see huge trucks with tractors and folded-up combines mounted on long flat-beds roaring up and down Main Street. For a couple of weeks custom cutters harvested fields of wheat and soon move on to another town. It was always interesting to watch as a kid. I remember as a kid playing around in the back of a big wheat truck while waiting for the combine to dump a load of grain. Then it was off to the mill to empty the wheat. It was so cool to be in the cab and feel the front end of the truck raise so all the grain fell out.

Colorado, 1883

Eighteen-year-old Miriam Goodspeed is a witch of Salem heritage, one of the Moonborn order. She is also the proprietor of CHARMS AND SUNDRIES, a curio shop in Denver. Sheriff Vance of Durango recruits her to help investigate a series of train hauntings. Who—or what—has possessed six expectant women aboard the Durango and Rio Grande Railroad? At her boarding house, she meets Natasha, a Moonborn dowser, Johansson, a Norwegian relic hunter, and Lopez, a Spanish gunslinger and Johansson’s bodyguard. Who will help or hinder Miriam in solving the mystery?

Soon, it is clear someone has planted demonic Kachina dolls aboard the Durango train. But why target pregnant townswomen? The answer is in the high desert—a place beyond the reach of the county sheriff. Miriam’s quest takes her to a Navajo village near Four Corners. There, she learns of a wandering half-human shaman who has disturbed the desert’s balance and harmony by practicing dark medicine. The man has turned himself into an almost invulnerable shapeshifter by honing his sorcery, killing the innocent, and turning their remains into poisonous bone dust.

Some call him a witch-devil. Others whisper he is a Skinwalker.

Join Miriam and a war party of Navajos as they make a perilous journey deeper into the desert, to a sacred canyon.

For a Duel at Skinwalker Canyon.

Currently, I have one novel published with Wild Rose Press. It is a historical novel set in Kansas in 1935 call Dust and Roses in print, Kindle edition and in Audible. My newest novel, Stalag Sunflower is still in the editing stage for publication, and I will keep you posted on its progress. Currently researching the sequel to Dust and Roses. Sara’s journey will continue.

Unlike many in 1935 Depression-era Kansas, 23-year-old, single Sara McGurk has a comfortable life, but a trip to the doctor reveals she is with child. The results are banishment from home and a violent argument with her lover that leaves her bleeding and abandoned in front of a forbidding limestone house.

A group of social outcasts take her in. Now, Sara must face an uncertain future while coping with her odd fellow residents. Can she keep her baby? Will she make peace ever again with her father? Can she escape her shame and find love and happiness?

Tune in for the shattering climax.

Listen to the first chapter of Dust and Roses