Nevada City, the "Queen of the Northern Mines," was a vibrant community in the Sierra foothills in the 1860s. The story's characters, real and fictional, come from all over the globe. In addition to the central theme of warring Americans, the book tells of Ah Tie, a Chinese mine owner who is denied justice for his two murdered guards; of Peter Kessel, an Austrian musician and absconded revolutionary, who finds an improbable bride in the American wilderness; and of Nutim, a Nisenan orphan, who plots revenge against the white 'ghost people' who are destroying his tribe.

Queen of the Northern Mines was a finalist for the IPBA's 2012 Ben Franklin Prize for historical fiction.