The Magic Journey

Boom times came to the forgotten little south-western town of Chamisaville just as the rest of America was in the Great Depression, when a rattle-trap bus loaded with stolen dynamite blew sky-high, leaving behind a giant gushing hot spring. Spanning forty years, The Magic Journey tells the tale of how Progress transforms a rural backwater into a boom-town. At first, it is a magic time for Chamisaville -- almost as if every day were a holiday. But as the land hungry developers, speculators, and interlopers move in, Chamisaville's people find themselves all but displaced, their children no longer heirs to their land or their traditions. With mounting intensity, The Magic Journey reaches a climax that is tragically foreordained. A sensitive, vital, and honest chronicle of life in America's Southwest, it is also an incisive commentary on what America has become on its road to Progress.