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A Name Stolen
Charlie Randall survives by knowing when to stay at the table and when to leave town.
He moves through the northern Pennsylvania timber towns following card games and pig’s ears; illegal saloons hidden in sheds and back rooms where whiskey flows after dark and money changes hands quietly. In Galeton, he learns how company scrip circulates before wages are earned, and how quickly a stranger can be blamed when it turns up in the wrong place. In Austin, the gambling grows sharper, the drinking heavier, and the sense that his name is being spoken in rooms he has never entered begins to take hold. In Costello, the road finally slows, and Charlie learns how easily a borrowed name can become a permanent mark.
By the time the path carries him toward Blowville, Charlie understands that what follows him is not chance, but design. A system built on silence, missing accounts, and men who are convenient to use and easier to discard.
A Name Stolen is a historical novel set in the logging towns of late-nineteenth-century Potter County, Pennsylvania, where pig’s ears flourished, gambling and drink blurred the line between survival and law, and a stranger’s name could be made to carry another man’s burden.
He moves through the northern Pennsylvania timber towns following card games and pig’s ears; illegal saloons hidden in sheds and back rooms where whiskey flows after dark and money changes hands quietly. In Galeton, he learns how company scrip circulates before wages are earned, and how quickly a stranger can be blamed when it turns up in the wrong place. In Austin, the gambling grows sharper, the drinking heavier, and the sense that his name is being spoken in rooms he has never entered begins to take hold. In Costello, the road finally slows, and Charlie learns how easily a borrowed name can become a permanent mark.
By the time the path carries him toward Blowville, Charlie understands that what follows him is not chance, but design. A system built on silence, missing accounts, and men who are convenient to use and easier to discard.
A Name Stolen is a historical novel set in the logging towns of late-nineteenth-century Potter County, Pennsylvania, where pig’s ears flourished, gambling and drink blurred the line between survival and law, and a stranger’s name could be made to carry another man’s burden.
315 pages, ebook
Published May 5, 2026
About the author
Scott E. Adams
7 books18 followersScott draws his inspiration from the quiet woods of Potter County, Pennsylvania, where he keeps a cabin tucked among the trees. After learning that a once-thriving logging community had existed near his property, he began researching its past—and uncovered a remarkable history of industry, hardship, prohibition, and everyday life in the Pennsylvania wilderness at the turn of the century. Those discoveries sparked the world in which his historical fiction novels now take place.
When he’s not spending as much time as possible at his Potter County retreat, Scott lives in State College, Pennsylvania, with his wife and their two cats.
When he’s not spending as much time as possible at his Potter County retreat, Scott lives in State College, Pennsylvania, with his wife and their two cats.
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Review of advance copy received from Author
Every so often, a novel comes along that feels less like reading and more like being quietly escorted into another time—and A Name Stolen is exactly that kind of book. Through Charlie Randall’s eyes, the rough edges of northern Pennsylvania’s timber towns come alive: the sawdust in the air, the lamplight flickering over card tables, the uneasy camaraderie of men living by their wits and whiskey.What impressed me most was how vividly the author captures both the geography and the moral terrain of the era. Each town—Galeton, Austin, Costello, Blowville—feels distinct yet bound by the same undercurrent of silence and survival. Charlie’s journey isn’t just one of movement but of revelation; he slowly uncovers how easily identity can be used, twisted, or stolen in a system built for exploitation.The writing itself is beautiful—measured, unsentimental, and deeply immersive. It evokes a landscape of decay and resilience, where every exchange carries weight and every glance hints at danger. It’s a story about luck and loss, but also about the quiet dignity of a man trying to stay one step ahead of a world that trades in deceit.A Name Stolen is historical fiction at its finest: atmospheric, elegantly written, and hauntingly human.
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