Publisher's Synopsis
The stakes for American expansion were enormously high--at a time when Britain, France, and Spain were also all vying for control of the vast expanse of land west of the Mississippi River, the geopolitics of discovery were paramount. Jefferson, a true student of the Enlightenment, sought out men of science to undertake these urgent missions into the frontier. But they weren't always well-matched--with each other, or even with the task of exploring itself. Tensions between Dunbar and Hunter in particular threatened to undermine Jefferson's progress, leaving the United States in danger of losing its foothold in the West.
No previous book has ever attempted to sort out and simultaneously pull together Jefferson's age of exploration. The individual stories here are gripping -- equally ambitious and death-defying -- making for a great, suspenseful narrative, while the story as a whole offers readers a broader look than has ever been given of the era of American exploration.