“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.” ~ L.P. Hartley

Mary Ellen Johnson

When disgraced social media influencer Maeve Mooney—whose greatest ambition is to marry money so she never has to work again—tumbles down an abandoned mine shaft that her daft Irish grandmother insisted was “magical,” she is transported to 1901 Cripple Creek. Thanks to the discovery of  rich veins of gold in what was previously a remote cow pasture, Cripple Creek has become Colorado's fourth largest city.  The District is home to overnight millionaires, ambitious entrepreneurs and hardworking miners who, thanks to the Western Federation of Miners, have created a prosperous life for themselves and their families. Maeve soon finds employment as a piano player, entertaining wealthy businessmen with songs such as “Rocky Mountain High” (which  won’t be written for decades), and ordinary workers at the Pick-Axe saloon, owned by charismatic union leader Ronan Doyle. Maeve is initially determined to stay neutral amidst rising tensions between miners and mine owners, but after she and Ronan become lovers, she champions the union cause. She believes as passionately as Ronan in the WFM slogan: **Labor produces all wealth. Wealth belongs to the producers thereof.** After a strike is called in Cripple Creek and across the state, Maeve works tirelessly on behalf of the strikers and their families. But Maeve knows how the Colorado Labor Wars will end. How could she not? She was raised on stories of the strike, and of the courage of her great-great grandfather, who almost single-handedly stood up to the mine owners and their stooges. (Another lie, which she soon discovers.) History books tell the actual tale.   The Wars end in disaster. The WFM will be eradicated; the miners and their families arrested, imprisoned and banned forever from the District. Cripple Creek itself will never recover.  And what will happen to Ronan Doyle? Maeve has a choice. Remain in 1904 Cripple Creek to witness the annihilation of her and Ronan’s dream--and possibly his death? Or return to the 21st century and a life without even the possibility of her beloved?