Beyond the Campfire realistically portrays Prehistoric America at the end of the Pleistocene and unites a riveting storyline and diverse characters with clues taken from the archaeological record and oral traditions of early Americans. Critics have hailed John Bradford Branney’s books for their accurate and vivid depictions of Prehistoric America. Author Branney guides his readers through the plains and mountains of the Rocky Mountains accompanied by a colorful band of adventurers including a cheh^pi warrior named Tonwan and a folsom hunter named Cansha. The author also reacquaints readers with a favorite character or two from previous Shadow on the Trail Pentalogy books!
“The original book in the series titled Shadows on the Trail started out as a one-off book. It told the story of how a twelve-thousand-year-old stone artifact from a prehistoric rock quarry in Texas ended up in northern Colorado where I discovered it thousands of years later,” Author Branney pointed out. “Due to the popularity of the first book, I expanded the book series to a trilogy…and then a quadrilogy…and now Beyond the Campfire makes it a pentalogy. The five-book series follows the lives of three generations of a Paleoindian family. Will there be more books in the series? Only time will tell.”
Beyond the Campfire picks up where the first four adventures left off; climate change, hostile humans, dangerous beasts, and survival remain the concerns for the small band of Paleoindians surviving on the mountains and plains of a violent and untamed world. Author Branney’s story captures the tumultuous changes and disasters that plagued early Americans and highlights the difficulties these tough people faced.
