“Our country needs more heroes, Rian. Black, white, male, female, young, old . . . it doesn’t matter. We need more heroes.”

Philadelphia, U.S.A. 1838. Like America, the Krieger companies are clawing their way back from the Panic of 1837. Fourteen-year-old Rian Krieger knows this because she starts every workday as her father’s bookkeeper and the money is flowing in. When the accounting is up to date, Rian scoots to her real love: the production floor of Krieger Locomotive.  

To Rian, idleness equals bad, but not in a “rich people are industrious and the poor are idle” sort of way. If Rian doesn’t immerse herself in a task that demands total concentration—bookkeeping, drawing a new part for a locomotive, pouring molten iron into a mold, caulking a boiler—dark thoughts gnaw their way loose like rats escaping from a burlap bag. You are The Oddity: The girl who hates girly-girl things. The girl who wears boys’ clothing. The girl who intends to run Krieger Locomotive someday. Then an exploding steam engine puts Rian’s plan in jeopardy and makes way for a host of new rat-thoughts.

Rian’s father, Otto, bets everything—factories, home, reputation—on his assumption that the railroad industry will lead America out of the depression. He has to be successful, for if he doesn’t build a fortune, how else will his daughter marry well?

And in South Carolina, Olivia Tucker, the daughter of plantation owners, rebels against her destiny: a life of privilege built on the backs of the enslaved. Olivia enlists Rian in a long-distance conspiracy to burn the daily cruelties of the South’s slave system into the American consciousness.

Book 1, The Conductor: “At the heart of the story is the tomboy Rian Krieger, a girl of German-Irish parents, just eleven at the start of the book, but whip smart, curious about everything, and wise beyond her years. Her idiosyncratic energy, inquisitiveness and sense of justice is the engine that makes the plot run and brings all the other characters and the many elements of this ambitious tale together. She's a likeable hero we can all root for.”

Book 2, The Coachman: “Roger Smith deftly interweaves fiction with nonfiction as he makes history come alive. And his skillful character development engenders a fondness for the characters, especially Rian’s father Otto, the self-emancipated slave Jules Freeman, and Rian’s Irish cousin Seamus.”

Book 3, The Blackmailer: “One does not need to have read the earlier books to enjoy this one... As those in Rian’s orbit understand, and those who underestimate her soon discover, she’s a force to be reckoned with. All of which make her a great protagonist!

by Roger A Smith
Page Count: 336
Trim Size: 6 X 9
Publish Date: April 22, 2025
Imprint: Milford House Press
Genre: Historical
FICTION / Historical / Civil War Era
FICTION / LGBTQ+ / Transgender
FICTION / African American & Black / Historical