England was a cauldron of discontent and unrest. Sir Francis Drake had sailed around the world, opening new horizons that beckoned many trapped by poverty and status. Spain dominated the Christian world and the Church of England stood defiant against the Pope in Rome. The Dutch revolted against their Spanish overlords and the war raged on with no end in sight. The Irish rebelled against English domination and the plague ran unchecked through the streets of London. Queen Elizabeth, dependent on her conspiratorial counselors, signed the death warrant for her half-sister, Bloody Mary, Queen of Scots. The long war with Spain had begun as ships of the Armada gathering for invasion. Against this grievous background, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, Walter Raleigh's half-brother, led an expedition—with the blessing and letters patent of the crown—to take possession of Newfoundland and all lands to the north and south.
       Three years later, Aleyn James was born to a poor fishing family in the English village of Brean on Bristol Bay. Despite his lowly beginnings, Aleyn was fated to a life of high adventure, one in which he both witnessed and played a role in the very founding of America. The James Saga begins with Thunder Snow when young Aleyn learns his trade under his father's watchful eye. It continues as Aleyn is caught up in a natural disaster that sweeps away all comfort of home and family, leading him to a strange and faraway land, a wilderness known as Mawooshen.

        What inner force drives men from the comfort and safety of home and hearth to the deprivations and perils in unknown lands? For the English settlers who sought to improve their lot in the New World, there had been more pitfalls than successes. The northern colony at Fort St. George abandoned their fortification and all chance of success, returning defeated with little to show for a year's hardship and suffering. James Towne Fort had suffered hostile attacks, internal conflict, ineptitude, starvation, disease, and violent death. Yet the craving for a new and better life was hard to kill.

       Many of those returned from George Popham's failed northern colony soon joined the 3rd re-supply of James Towne being organized in the English port towns of Woolwich and Plymouth. In a sprawling adventure that begins on the coast of England, develops at the fledgling colony at James Towne, and sails up the coast of Mawooshen to Acadia and points beyond, the spellbinding story of Aleyn James and Acoona Stonefire continues with Dry Rain.