Author of Fortune’s Frenzy: A California Gold Rush Odyssey

Eilene Lyon writes history with a focus on 19th-century America. Her first book, Fortune’s Frenzy, came out in September 2023.

You can read her stories about family, history, travel, memoir, and nature at her blog: Myricopia.com

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Don’t miss this true story about desperately poor Indiana farmers using shady financing to make their way to California during the gold rush, and the devastating impacts to their families and their futures.

Fortune’s Frenzy relates previously untold aspects of the gold rush: how the wealthy took advantage of gold fever by offering usurious loans, and how the cold calculus of transporting people to California became a deadly game for profit.

ISBN ‎ 978-1493070060

** 2024 Finalist WWA Spur Award **

** 2024 Will Rogers Medallion **

How do we remember the forty-niners? … Perhaps we picture a grizzled prospector panning for gold, broke and desperate, praying for the mother lode. Whatever we imagine, according to a new book by Eilene Lyon, the reality was much worse… “Fortune’s Frenzy” recasts a pivotal American myth — that of rugged miners striking out to wrest their fortunes from the land — as a boondoggle, a con. It’s a reminder that since the country was founded, capitalism has been grinding people like Jenkins and Ransom into dust. Once upon a time, the dust was gold. — The New York Times

Richly detailed, this book focuses on a facet of the California gold rush that is largely overlooked in other accounts… Anyone who expects to acquire a balanced, complete understanding of the California gold rush should read this book. ― Roundup Magazine

Fortune’s Frenzy is a romping good read from start to finish. The historical actors are compelling, the writing is crisp, and the storyline is beautifully conceived and skillfully developed. Anyone who enjoys a good, fast-paced historical adventure will find it difficult to put down. More serious readers of the Gold Rush era will also find much to like about this book. Seldom have the human relations of this turbulent time been portrayed so vividly and realistically. College and high school teachers looking to liven up their reading lists for California and U.S. history courses would do well to consider this book. — David Vaught, Professor of History, Texas A&M University, and author of “After the Gold Rush: Tarnished Dreams in the Sacramento Valley”