Under the Heartless Blue - Softcover

'An astonishing, accomplished novel. The vivid, visceral descriptions transport the reader to the Arizona of the 1880s and French Battlefields of 1918 as we follow the life of the extraordinary Vera Palmer. Alive with memorable characters, this is a novel to be savoured and remembered.' Maureen Myant, author of The Search; 'Allyson Stack brings us a committed, luminous debut; a historical novel you won't forget. Vera's story is gutsy, effervescent and mesmerising.' Alan Warner, author of Morvern Callar and The Stars in the Bright Sky; 'An impressive debut... in Vera we have a protagonist, vulnerable and adventurous, open-hearted and independent, in whose company it is a pleasure to travel. This is a bewitching story of love, loss and survival told with humour and heart-breaking honesty.' Iain Maloney, author of The Waves Burn Bright

Arizona, 1884, and Vera Palmer, a 23 year old widow from genteel Connecticut arrives in the frontier town of Goose Flat with a prospecting claim and a book-keeping job secured from afar. Little does she know, but the boarding house is in fact a brothelwhere she must keep accounts for the coyly manipulative Madam Sadie Blair. Undaunted, Vera sets out to strike it rich with the help of the charismatic local lawyer, Will Keane, who has fled West to escape demons of his own.But as their romance blossoms, Vera finds herself increasingly embroiled in the violent, abused lives of Blair's prostitutes. Can love offer her an escape or will the unpredictable, dangerous world surrounding the Star Mansion brothel destroy Vera's hopes of a new life? Here Allyson Stack offers a gripping, beautifully wrought love story amidst a wholly authentic evocation of the Wild West at its most threatening.