Slip-Slidin' Down Gold Mountain

There have gotta be better choices than beheading, hanging or slavery for the young son of a famous Cantonese martial hero and a legendary woman warrior-shaman. Northern California, 1850's: Heroes and villains from three cultures (Native Peoples, Chinese, Anglo) collide violently as they struggle to survive the raw, quickly-changing frontier society of the Gold Rush. This historical fiction novel in the wu jia genre—American style—is all action, with an edgy story of 114,000 words.

The woman warrior-shaman Yana from Mt. Shasta and the south China kung fu master Tai-Ying join forces to fight for the rights of their peoples. During their struggles, their destinies intertwine, they have a son, Ishi, and unite forces. Some of the trials Yana and Tai-Ying face include: their loss of personal freedom (slammed into Sailors Prison on the Embarcadero, SF); their escape from the US Army’s grasp; organized racial bashing and extermination; collusion of US government and corporations with Triads in running drugs, arms, laborers, prostitutes.

Yana is faced with invading hordes of Anglo-European enemies who want to exterminate her tribe. As warrior-shaman she undergoes rigorous training that burdens her with choosing between a spiritual response to extinction or immediate guerilla warfare retaliation to save her people.

Tai-Ying, famous “Red Stick” hero of Kwangtung and the chief Enforcer for the Hung Muhn Society, arrives in Chinatown as a problem solver for the newly-arrived Chinese laborers.  Landing smack in the middle of a war for valuable turf between the Tongs, Irish toughs, and prominent Anglo businessmen, he finds “Gold Mountain” to be a dark labyrinth of illegal trade between the Triads and the U.S. government. 

Ishi, son of Yana and Tai-Ying, is sent away to the remote White Lotus Monastery in the Trinity Mountains to save his skin—and the mysterious blue jade key, an 800-years old family treasure. ISHI’s physical-mental-spiritual training at the Monastery, under mentorship of ABBOT CHAN and MARTIAL MASTER PAN, is instrumental in healing this boy who thinks he has lost both parents. Gradually Ishi realizes that Chan is providing the government with a strike team of warrior monks against the tribal coalition. 

Livingston Lowe, from Back Bay Boston old money, is determined to earn his spurs as a canny predator in the wilds of unbridled American commerce of the Old West. The frontier reality demands he do whatever necessary to survive and succeed in business—including murder and sex-slaving.

Slip-Slidin’ Down Gold Mountain is a work of historical fiction based on fact—not politically-correct propaganda--and documented by the social history of California, Boston, and Kwangtung, China of the 1850’s.  

Slip-Slidin’ Down Gold Mountain is an American wu-jia action-adventure story that weaves a story of cultural myopia, class warfare, gender models and manipulation, examining the differing mind-sets and behavior during the Gold Rush, and the impacts that have goose-stepped us up to the edge of self-extinction.

Notably, California was unique in being the first place in North America where the state officially sanctioned extermination of a race. This story—of people at the mercy of the governing elite—is not new. Slip-Slidin’ Down Gold Mountain recounts a story of cultural myopia and its paradigm that have goose-stepped us up to the edge of self-extinction.