THE TRAVELS OF JAIMIE MCPHEETERS is a work I rank right up there with Lonesome Dove. So did the Pulitzer juries, awarding the prize to each in its year of publication. With that bit of background, I have a simple charge for you: Prepare yourself for a wonderful reading experience. This is a novel that will entertain you royally. It will also--had I better whisper it?--teach you a lot about the mores, preoccupations, geography--and perils--of America at the time of the Gold Rush...But JAIMIE MCPHEETERS is, first and last, a bang-up story, stirring and funny by turns. It`s presented as a personal memoir; the reflections of a mature man recalling the supreme adventure of his life.... Although based in part on the journal of a real gold-seeker, Taylor`s novel reminds me in many ways of Dickens. The tale is along; packed with exciting incident; and built around a gallery of memorable characters, the most important being the wryly reflective Jaimie, and his father, Dr. Sardius McPheeters...[Sardius] is the quintessential American Argonaut, dreamily and desperately opting for a new start; the second chance....You`ll long remember him, and his son, and others you`ll meet on this journey from Louisville, Kentucky, General Delivery, Upper California.