When Robert W. Service was transferred to the Whitehorse Branch of the Canadian Bank of Commerce in the Yukon Territory in 1904, six years after the Klondike Gold Rush, his career as a world-famous poet would soon begin. Inspired by the beauty of the Yukon wilderness, Service would write some of the most expressive poetry of the age depicting the trials and tribulations of the Yukon gold mining life. Best Tales of the Yukon collects together forty-seven of these poems. Selected from two of his earliest volumes, Spell of the Yukon and Other Verses and Ballads of a Cheechako, this volumes includes some of Service's most memorable poetry including the classics The Shooting of Dan McGrew, The Law of the Yukon, and The Cremation of Sam McGee.

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Robert Service's time in the Yukon, at first as a transplanted bank clerk and later living off the royalties of poems like "The Shooting of Dan McGrew" and "The Cremation of Sam McGee," is the core of a fascinating life. Starving in Mexico, residing in a

New York Times bestselling author Howard Blum expertly weaves together three narratives to tell the true story of the 1897 Klondike Gold Rush. It is the last decade of the 19th century. The Wild West has been tamed and its fierce, independent and often violent larger-than-life figures--gun-toting wanderers, trappers, prospectors, Indian fighters, cowboys, and lawmen--are now victims of their own success. But then gold is discovered in Alaska and the adjacent Canadian Klondike and a new frontier suddenly looms: an immense unexplored territory filled with frozen waterways, dark spruce forests, and towering mountains capped by glistening layers of snow and ice. In a true-life tale that rivets from the first page, we meet Charlie Siringo, a top-hand sharp-shooting cowboy who becomes one of the Pinkerton Detective Agency’s shrewdest; George Carmack, a California-born American Marine who’s adopted by an Indian tribe, raises a family with a Taglish squaw, and makes the discovery that starts off the Yukon Gold Rush; and Jefferson "Soapy" Smith, a sly and inventive conman who rules a vast criminal empire. As we follow this trio’s lives, we’re led inexorably into a perplexing mystery: a fortune in gold bars has somehow been stolen from the fortress-like Treadwell Mine in Juneau, Alaska. Charlie Siringo discovers that to run the thieves to ground, he must embark on a rugged cross-territory odyssey that will lead him across frigid waters and through a frozen wilderness to face down "Soapy" Smith and his gang of 300 cutthroats. Hanging in the balance: George Carmack’s fortune in gold. At once a compelling true-life mystery and an unforgettable portrait of a time in America’s history, The Floor of Heaven is also an exhilarating tribute to the courage and undaunted spirit of the men and women who helped shape America.

From the hilarious and subversive children's author, essayist and NPR commentator, true tales drawn from his cordial--if dysfunctional--relationships with the dogs in his life. illustrations.

The absolutely inspiring true tale of a young couple who gave up the "good life" in England to start a new life in the wilderness of the Yukon Dorian Amos—a painter from Cornwall—and his wife decided that they were in need of adventure, so they gave up their comfortable life and traveled to Yukon Territory in the remote Canadian wilderness. Told by Dorian with warmth and humor, this is the compelling account of their adventures. Buying a piece of land in the forest just outside Dawson City, they revel in the stark beauty of the landscape and the liberation they feel from the mundanity of their former home—crossing frozen rivers just to buy food, hunting caribou, coming face to face with bears, and building their own log cabin. The perfect tale for anyone feeling that there must be more to life, their story will convince readers to stop putting their dreams on hold.

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