Much Ado about Grubstake is one fun book. It's set in Grubstake, a rundown, dying mining town in the Old West. Arley Pickett is a 16-year-old girl who runs a boarding house for some of the few miners who remain. She, too, owns a mine, left by her father who died in an explosion there, so she doesn't much care for mines anymore.
One day, on the train that comes to Grubstake once a month, a city slicker arrives who offers cash for any of the mines the miners want to sell. Arley is immediately suspicious. Who would want to pay money for mines that were all dried up? That begins her humorous adventures of determining who the bad guys are, what's really going on, and how to save the people she cares for...unusual though they may be. There's Everdene, the saloon owner who's been burned by men; Duncan, the young newspaper owner/journalist; Outdoor John and Prairie Martin, two of Arley's boarders; pretentious Lacey, nasty Charles Randall, and mysterious Morgan to name a few.
If you take this book seriously, you likely won't enjoy it. However, if you read it the way it seems to be intended, it's just plain lighthearted fun. My guess is that is, indeed, the author's intention, because Arley, the main character, likes to read Penny Dreadfuls...and that's what this book seems somewhat reminiscent of.
Topics: mining, boarders, boarding house, troublesome dog, miners, swindlers, power through coercion,
Genre: historical fiction (1888)
Mrs. Beckwith's review: 4 of 5
(I agree with the one Amazon reviewer who has posted at this time....I don't know why the critic from School Library Journal was so harsh with this book. I thought it was a fun read.)
Amazon Reviews
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