#AtoZChallenge 2024 letter G

W. Michael Gear and Kathleen O’Neal Gear

The Gears have written a huge number of books both together and separately. Their most prolific series is North America’s Forgotten Past Series which is historical fiction about Native Americans. The series starts with people crossing over from Asia and moves forward in time in jumps up to conflict with invading Europeans.

With such a vast time being covered, you can pick it up in the era or location that you are most interested in. I liked reading about areas of the country that I have lived in. There are some multi-book arcs featuring the same characters or places. That isn’t always immediately obvious from the titles so it is good to check this out on Goodreads to make sure you aren’t picking up a story in the middle.

This series does have a lot of mysticism in it. Seers and magic users are common so I don’t know that I would call this straight historical fiction as it is normally portrayed.

I’m always a bit hesitant to recommend books about Native American history written by people who don’t appear to claim Native American descent. They are archeologists who wanted to write books that weren’t filled with historical inaccuracies. I don’t know how Native American people would feel about them.

These books attempt to show how people lived in North America, especially in cities like Cahokia. There are mysteries and plots and intrigues.