When widowed mule breeder Cy Bellman reads in the newspaper that colossalancient bones have been discovered in the salty Kentucky mud, he sets out fromhis small Pennsylvania farm to see for himself if the rumors are true: thatthe giant monsters are still alive and roam the uncharted wilderness beyondthe Mississippi River. Promising to write and to return in two years, heleaves behind his only daughter, Bess, to the tender mercies of his taciturnsister and heads west.With only a barnyard full of miserable animals and her dead mother’s gold ringto call her own, Bess, unprotected and approaching womanhood, fills lonelydays tracing her father’s route on maps at the subscription library andwaiting for his letters to arrive. Bellman, meanwhile, wanders farther andfarther from home, across harsh and alien landscapes, in reckless pursuit ofthe unknown.words : 33341