This was another Kindle First, so I didn’t pay for it, which is great. Abandon is a town way way up in the mountains in Colorado. It was a mining town that eventually went bust. The story is split between 1893 and 2009. It’s told from a few different people’s perspectives. The 1893 people tell the story of Abandon before it was abandoned (haha, get it?). The 2009 people are climbing up the mountain to see the old town and maybe try to figure out what happened there.
Of course all is not as it seems in either story. There’s some mysterious gold bars that somehow factor into both stories. The 2009 people include some trail guides, a pair of paranormal photographers, a journalist writing about those paranormal photographers, and the journalist’s estranged father (who happens to be a guide too). The 1893 people include a variety of mining town people. There’s a wife beater, a drunken cop, a bartender who’s scheduled to be executed, and the rich mayor. The gold bars play a huuuuuge part in this section of the story.
A big storm starts up and the whole mountain is covered in snow in BOTH (!) stories. It makes everyone’s lives harder. There is a lot of backstabbing, double crossing, and murder in both stories. The gold bars seem to be cursed, as everyone who touches them or looks for them ends up in a bad way. The main character may or may not make it out alive, and may or may not be tried for murder. I’d recommend this book too!