Heart of Abigail

R. Phillip Ritter is the son of a father who worked as a cost analyst in the aerospace industry and a mother who taught first grade for nearly three decades. Born in Des Moines, Iowa in January 1952, his family moved to Southern California before he began the first grade. He attended second grade through high school in Anaheim, and then California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo. He graduated with a bachelor of architecture degree in 1975. He completed his thesis year in Denmark, and while there met Kristine (born in Alaska, she was completing her second year of architecture through the University of Idaho) in the balcony of the Royal Danish Ballet in Copenhagen during a performance of Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet. He moved to Alaska and married Kris a few years later and has lived there ever since. The author and his wife have two sons, Kristian and Ryan.

Weaving spellbinding fiction into meticulously researched history, Heart of Abigail tells the harrowing story of bonnie Abigail Sinclair, a young nurse who travels from Edinburgh, Scotland to Alaska in 1899 to work at the St. Ann's Hospital in Douglas during the height of the great gold mines of Treadwell, 700 Foot, Mexican, and Ready Bullion. Against a backdrop of authentic history, Abigail experiences her first true love, perilous danger, malignant retribution, and ultimate redemption as she confronts the deepest feelings of her own heart. Richly illustrated throughout with historic photographs relevant to the story, Heart of Abigail will imbue the reader with clear and intimate knowledge of the mining history of Juneau, Douglas, and Treadwell within the transparent fabric of a masterful fictional story.