Book Blurb:
The fine line between friends and enemies blurs as Ellis Cady sets out to reach the new frontier of post-Civil War America.
After waiting out winter at the Cady ranch in southern Missouri, hope blooms in the Spring of 1866. Ellis receives news of a mysterious man arriving in St. Louis. Will she find her father alive and well, or finally put his memory to rest?
Grasping at the illusive promise of her father’s whereabouts, Ellis is distracted by the intrepid trick rider, Jimmie, a woman who rides with Levi Jack’s Wild West Exhibition. Then, talk of reinstating a messenger service akin to the Pony Express rekindles a faded dream. Since the war’s devastation, important letters and messages still need to get through a Western landscape governed by Indians and outlaws. When an untimely epidemic threatens, Ellis finds herself back in the saddle, a young woman and her horse on a perilous trail.
My Review:
Zephyr Trails actually continues the story of Ellis Cady of Book 1 who discovers herself left alone with missing and passed family following the end of the Civil War. After the loss of her twin brother, she assumes his identity to more safely travel alone, cutting her hair and wearing male clothing. She is an accomplished horsewoman, so few note the small feminine tells she works hard to disguise.
Ellis is seeking her father, said to have finished out the war in a POW camp, as she pushes west toward remote relatives and her ultimate goal of settling west. As she studies her options and refines her skills, she takes on a number of jobs, working with a Wild West show and signing up for Pony Express rides.
Ellis is torn. She is picking up clues about her father and possibly finding avenues to the west while her aunt and uncle invite her to remain on their ranch in Missouri. I liked her connection to the characters in the Wild West show but obviously the plot could not sustain a storyline with her work in a show that doesn’t further her overriding goal.
I had a bit of a problem with the pace, which seemed to bog down a couple times, stalling while she grapples with her next course of action. The thread with the father becomes difficult, exhibiting PTSD symptoms. She struggles with her own identity, stubbornly independent. There are a couple reoccurring character relationships that appear to savor a connection without her apparent interest. (Maybe next installment?)
Did she find her father and re-establish some semblance of family? Or will she find her way west?
The CE read Ellis River in September, 2022, and loved it. I read Zephyr Trails as a standalone, perhaps would have been better had I started with Ellis River? I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the author and publisher through @NetGalley that in no way influenced this review. These are my honest thoughts.
Rosepoint Rating: Four Stars 
Book Details:
Genre: Parenting & Relationships, Historical Fiction
Publisher: Bay Feather Books
ISBN-13: 979-8985997422
ASIN: B0D6X9DS4M
Print Length: 321 pages
Publication Date: June 24, 2024
Source: Publisher and NetGalley
Title Link(s):
Amazon-US | Amazon-UK | Barnes & Noble | Kobo
The Author: Nicki Ehrlich grew up in Southern Illinois before attending college at the University of Denver and later, Idaho State University, where she graduated with a B.A. in Philosophy/English. After living ten “horse-rich” years in Idaho, she moved on to Oregon, and later Washington, where she realized she had unwittingly traveled the Oregon Trail.
While living in the Pacific Northwest, Nicki continued to write fiction, non-fiction and poetry. Her debut novel, Ellis River, is the 2023 winner of the Independent Book Publishers Association’s Bill Fisher Award for Best First Book – fiction. The novel was also a finalist for the Eric Hoffer First Horizons Award, and received an Honorable Mention for the Eric Hoffer Grand Prize. Nicki has won additional awards for her poetry and creative writing, including the Writer’s Digest Annual Poetry Awards and the Ray Fabrizio Memorial Award. Nicki holds a Certificate in Creative Writing from Monterey Peninsula College and is a member of the Central Coast branch of the California Writers Club. She also holds a Coast Guard Captain’s License and currently lives on California’s inspiring central coast where she is at work on the sequel to Ellis River.
You can find Nicki at: NickiEhrlich.com, Instagram, and Goodreads.
©2024 V Williams
For fifteen-year-old Ellis Cady, life has gone quiet on her western Tennessee homestead. Her father and older brother left to sell horses to the army two years earlier and never returned. She watched her mother’s health decline, finally succumbing to a broken heart. Her twin brother left in search of their father, and while he was gone neighbors moved out of their Quaker community, searching for peace ahead of the final sweep of war.
The military came to most of the farms in Tennessee and requisitioned most of the horses for use in the war effort. The “fair price” paid by the military did not compensate for the loss of utility and companionship of the animals. The soldiers used them until they got too thin, old, or infirmed, and then simply abandoned them.
The author writes a very compassionate and sympathetic narrative of a tragic time in our American history. I appreciated the thoughtful way she approached the issues of a woman who is trying to hide her femininity, identity proclivities, and struggles with her own identity. I was moved by the overall narrative experience. 5 stars – CE Williams
Rosepoint Publishing 