The Squatter and the Don (Annotated)

The Squatter and the Don is a romance of manners, law, and dispossession set in post–Mexican-American War California, where the Alamars, an old Californio landholding family, confront Anglo squatters, corrupt courts, and the encroaching power of the railroad. Published in 1885, the novel adapts the conventions of sentimental fiction and domestic romance to a sharp political critique of Reconstruct...