Wyoming 1890. Annabella Chase was sent out west to teach by a brother who didn't want his sister intruding on his marriage. She spent almost ten years as a lonely spinster teacher moving from one school to another each time moving further west. One day having lost her enthusiasm for teaching she answered an ad for a wife, marrying a widower with a young son, becoming Annabella Chase Winters. An accident claimed her husband and stepson within a year of marriage. The father-in-law she had never met invited her to live with him in remote Wyoming. Accepting the invitation she arrived in Deep Wells, Wyoming, and her life was never dull and lonely again.

Renee Kumor was a stay-at-home mom for several years developing a personal ethic of community service. She began writing a political opinion column for the local newspaper, but retired from writing when she announced her candidacy for local political office. After eight years as a county commissioner, she returned to non-profit service and began writing a monthly column for the newspaper on non-profit management and service issues. The setting for the River Bend Chronicles' series reflects her early life in Ohio and her later years in western North Carolina.