Gabrielle Burton (1939–2015) was a writer whose numerous projects include the film Manna from Heaven, which she wrote and produced, and the novel Heartbreak Hotel, which won Scribner's 1985 Maxwell Perkins Prize, an award for a first work of fiction. She authored a novel she imagined as Tamsen Donner's journal, Impatient with Desire: The Lost Journal of Tamsen Donner. Burton's writing has also appeared in publications such as the New York Times and the Washington Post.

• [no TOC; 48 numbered chapters]

“An extraordinary `must-read’ memoir. . . . An unforgettable feminist family-on-the-road saga the likes of which I’ve never read before.”—Maureen Corrigan, NPR’s Fresh Air |“As dramatic and tragic as the story of the Donner Party is, it shares space here with the tender reflections of a mother of five daughters—daughters whose filial companionship on a summer road trip long ago bespoke a very different kind of family journey across the American West.”—William Deverell, Los Angeles Times Book Review|""[Searching for Tamsen Donner] is a thoughtful and engaging blend of history and memoir that inspires the reader to delve further into the Donner party's fate, while at the same time enjoying Burton's struggle to be both a full-time mother and successful writer.""—Deborah Donovan, Booklist Online|""[Burton] succeeds where other historians and biographers have failed in uncovering and publishing here all 17 of Donner's known letters from the journey. . . . Burton's curiosity to speculate and piece together clues as to circumstances surrounding Tamsen's fate . . . drives the narrative forward as if Burton's own perceived vulnerabilities somehow implicate her in the tragedy. It's the book's final uncoupling of these two parallel lives that is Tamsen Donner's legacy to pioneering women and Burton's literary triumph.""—R. D. Pohl, Buffalo News|“A moving exploration of a legendary American woman through the eyes of a modern heroine.”—Barbara Smith, Feminist Review|""This is, of course, as much Gabrielle Burton's story as it is that of Tamsen Donner, and as such captures the reader early with its sincerity and idealism, and, indeed, its obsession.""—Charles Stephen, Lincoln Journal Star

Gabrielle Burton (1939–2015) was a writer whose numerous projects include the film Manna from Heaven, which she wrote and produced, and the novel Heartbreak Hotel, which won Scribner's 1985 Maxwell Perkins Prize, an award for a first work of fiction. She authored a novel she imagined as Tamsen Donner's journal, Impatient with Desire: The Lost Journal of Tamsen Donner. Burton's writing has also appeared in publications such as the New York Times and the Washington Post.

• [no TOC; 48 numbered chapters]

“An extraordinary `must-read’ memoir. . . . An unforgettable feminist family-on-the-road saga the likes of which I’ve never read before.”—Maureen Corrigan, NPR’s Fresh Air |“As dramatic and tragic as the story of the Donner Party is, it shares space here with the tender reflections of a mother of five daughters—daughters whose filial companionship on a summer road trip long ago bespoke a very different kind of family journey across the American West.”—William Deverell, Los Angeles Times Book Review|""[Searching for Tamsen Donner] is a thoughtful and engaging blend of history and memoir that inspires the reader to delve further into the Donner party's fate, while at the same time enjoying Burton's struggle to be both a full-time mother and successful writer.""—Deborah Donovan, Booklist Online|""[Burton] succeeds where other historians and biographers have failed in uncovering and publishing here all 17 of Donner's known letters from the journey. . . . Burton's curiosity to speculate and piece together clues as to circumstances surrounding Tamsen's fate . . . drives the narrative forward as if Burton's own perceived vulnerabilities somehow implicate her in the tragedy. It's the book's final uncoupling of these two parallel lives that is Tamsen Donner's legacy to pioneering women and Burton's literary triumph.""—R. D. Pohl, Buffalo News|“A moving exploration of a legendary American woman through the eyes of a modern heroine.”—Barbara Smith, Feminist Review|""This is, of course, as much Gabrielle Burton's story as it is that of Tamsen Donner, and as such captures the reader early with its sincerity and idealism, and, indeed, its obsession.""—Charles Stephen, Lincoln Journal Star

Gabrielle Burton (1939–2015) was a writer whose numerous projects include the film Manna from Heaven, which she wrote and produced, and the novel Heartbreak Hotel, which won Scribner's 1985 Maxwell Perkins Prize, an award for a first work of fiction. She authored a novel she imagined as Tamsen Donner's journal, Impatient with Desire: The Lost Journal of Tamsen Donner. Burton's writing has also appeared in publications such as the New York Times and the Washington Post.

• [no TOC; 48 numbered chapters]

“An extraordinary `must-read’ memoir. . . . An unforgettable feminist family-on-the-road saga the likes of which I’ve never read before.”—Maureen Corrigan, NPR’s Fresh Air |“As dramatic and tragic as the story of the Donner Party is, it shares space here with the tender reflections of a mother of five daughters—daughters whose filial companionship on a summer road trip long ago bespoke a very different kind of family journey across the American West.”—William Deverell, Los Angeles Times Book Review|""[Searching for Tamsen Donner] is a thoughtful and engaging blend of history and memoir that inspires the reader to delve further into the Donner party's fate, while at the same time enjoying Burton's struggle to be both a full-time mother and successful writer.""—Deborah Donovan, Booklist Online|""[Burton] succeeds where other historians and biographers have failed in uncovering and publishing here all 17 of Donner's known letters from the journey. . . . Burton's curiosity to speculate and piece together clues as to circumstances surrounding Tamsen's fate . . . drives the narrative forward as if Burton's own perceived vulnerabilities somehow implicate her in the tragedy. It's the book's final uncoupling of these two parallel lives that is Tamsen Donner's legacy to pioneering women and Burton's literary triumph.""—R. D. Pohl, Buffalo News|“A moving exploration of a legendary American woman through the eyes of a modern heroine.”—Barbara Smith, Feminist Review|""This is, of course, as much Gabrielle Burton's story as it is that of Tamsen Donner, and as such captures the reader early with its sincerity and idealism, and, indeed, its obsession.""—Charles Stephen, Lincoln Journal Star