The "soft gold" of sea otter pelts lured the Russians across the Bearing Strait in the eighteenth century, and in the wake of the Cossacks came suffering and strife for the native Aluets. One Cossack, gentle and far-seeing, comes to understand the Aluets, and falls in love with one of their young women, the beautiful Tasha Tarakanov. She is forced to choose between her beloved Andrei and the safety of her people-and her decision marks the beginning of a proud and enduring family. Larissa Tarakanov falls in love with a dashing British sea captain and with him plies the perilous China trade; Zachar Tarakanov is fated to love the gorgeous Raven of the rival Tlingets, and for her he betrays his tribe's greatest secret. A clever American lawyer with political ambitions takes one of the Tarakanov women for his bride only to find that her native blood is a threat to his status. Another Tarakanov descendant, Marisha, runs away with a handsome young Klondike prospector in search of gold, but finds her fortune when she becomes Glory St. Clair, Alaska's most infamous madam. Finally, as a brave Alaska Scout, Glory's grandson Wylie Cole defends his homeland from foreign invasion in World War II, and lives to see Alaska's statehood in 1958. The story of these intrepid men and women, their dynasty, and their dreams is as grand as the land from which they sprang. The Great Alone brings alive Alaska's history, rendering the last American frontier in all its lonely splendor and epic adventure--Page 2 and 3 of cover.