New Release by Golda M. Storie

Cressie is a short novel about a young girl born in Southern Minnesota in the 1850s prior to the great Sioux Uprising of 1862. The story begins when Cressie is twelve years old on a homestead carved out of the Minnesota woods. She flees with her family southward into Iowa when the Sioux Indians go on the warpath. They are uprooted, fleeing for their lives, abandoning the only home she’s ever known.

Her family—her mother, father, and little brother Johnny—seek refuge at her Uncle Andrew’s homestead in northwest Iowa. Circumstances dictate that they cannot remain in Iowa any longer, so they (Cressie’s family and Uncle Andrew’s family) begin a long and arduous trek by covered wagon to the Dakota territory.

During these trying times, Cressie is forced to grow up quickly: from her being a “bound” girl to an unyielding taskmaster to her coming of age on the Dakota Prairies to, finally, the bumpy romance with Jack Cavanaugh, and the many exciting adventures she faces in her journey from the harsh Dakota prairies back to the relative safety of the rolling hills and green fields of Iowa. 

About the Author

Lawrence (Larry) Eslick is a native Montanan, born in Kalispell, Montana, in 1949.

The manuscript for this book was likely written in the late 1950s or early 1960s by 

Golda Montana Storie.

He acquired the manuscript after his parents died in the early 2000s while going through boxes of “stuff,” as is often the case when settling an estate.

Golda was his dad’s first cousin. Her mother was the sister of his dad’s father. Larry’s dad and Golda were very close, so he assumes she gave the manuscript to him some years after it was written.

Larry never heard it mentioned as he was growing up, even though they often visited Golda during the late ’50s and ’60s. Golda retired in the mid-’60s from teaching school in the Swan Valley, a very rural and isolated area forty or so miles southeast of Kalispell.

Golda passed away in 1989 at ninety-two. She’s buried at Kalispell, Montana (https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/124830419/golda-m-zeits_storie).

You can purchase this new release here.

For more information, visit Covenant Books.