Cities of Gold: A Journey Across the American Southwest Book

This riveting true story recounts the author's journey on horseback across Arizona and New Mexico, retracing Coronado's desperate search for the legendary Seven Cities of Gold. First published in 1992 and now available only from UNM Press, this classic adventure tale reveals the Southwest as it was when Europeans first saw it and shows how much, and how little, it has changed. "The great myth of the American West," Preston writes, "is that there was a winning of it."

In 1540, driven by the promise of unlimited wealth, the Spanish explorer Coronado led the first European expedition through the American Southwest. In 1989, Douglas Preston re-created the experience of those conquistadores to learn how it felt to discover a new world and its inhabitants.