She left the South as a privileged young woman. The West would make her a survivor.
After the Civil War destroys the world Gilliana knows, her wealthy Atlanta family heads west hoping to escape the devastation and uncertainty of the South.
Instead, bandits murder her father and brother and take Gilliana, her mother, Martha, and her younger sister, Ella, captive. Before they can be sold to a brothel, they are taken by Native warriors, and Gilliana and Ella become slaves.
In captivity, Gilliana learns to survive. With the help of a young woman named Dakia, she learns the language, customs, weapons, and skills she will need to endure. She also falls deeply in love with Skah, a warrior who gives her something she never expected to find—love.
But war, betrayal, and tragedy soon take everything from her again.
After a desperate escape, Gilliana is rescued by Gradon Maddox, the sheriff of Doomstown, Missouri—and a former Union soldier she has every reason to distrust.
Taken in by Tillie, a tough ranch widow, Gilliana slowly begins rebuilding her life. She learns to ride Western saddles, work cattle, mend fences, handle a rifle, and discover the strength buried beneath the Southern manners she was raised with.
Then something unexpected happens.
Gilliana begins to fall in love with the sheriff.
But the frontier is dangerous, and the past refuses to stay buried.
Doomstown by Ailene Frances is a sweeping historical Western romance about survival, courage, friendship, loss, and finding love after everything has been taken away.
