Black Fire: The True Story of the Original Tom Sawyer--and of the Mysterious Fires That Baptized Gold Rush-Era San Francisco - Softcover

"A harrowing account of Sawyer's involvement in the hunt for a serial arsonist who terrorized mid-nineteenth century San Francisco." --San Francisco Chronicle

"Graysmith has amassed an impressive amount of historical detail....A well-researched work about community and fire." --Cleveland Plain Dealer

"The journalist delved deep into archival material to find the connection between Mark Twain and a heroic San Francisco firefighter named Tom Sawyer, who became the model for one of Twain's most beloved characters." --Sacramento Bee

"Fascinating." --San Jose Mercury News

"A sizzling tale...[Graysmith] uncovers Mark Twain's friendship with the real-life Sawyer -- a colorful figure in the city's early firefighting culture -- and paints a detailed portrait of San Francisco, circa 1849-1866. It's jam-packed with notable residents whose long-ago importance lingers in the city's street names (Broderick, Brannan) -- plus mustachioed hooligans and "The Lightkeeper," an arsonist as mysterious as he was destructive." --San Francisco Bay Guardian

"Mark Twain fanatics and firefighter-history buffs alike will flock to the tale of the real-life Tom Sawyer's adventures fighting fires in the Gold Rush-era city, depicted in remarkable detail by Graysmith...Black Fire captures the spirit of rugged adventure so beloved in Twain's work and so characteristic of the undaunted city built--time and time again--on the hopes of fortune-hunters." --Booklist

"Rich...lively and chock-full of eye-opening tidbits" --Kirkus Reviews

"Packing a whirlwind of events around dizzying details of boggy, impassable streets choked with decaying refuse, characters of all manner of disrepute, throughout a booming city haphazardly constructed of highly flammable material, Graysmith (who also drew the book's illustrations) inserts a teenage Tom Sawyer, newly migrated from the east, into one of the most tumultuous periods in San Francisco's storied history... the book truly shines." --Publishers Weekly