"The Town on Rambling Creek is the best novel in the Matty Trescott series, a novel that could be read time and time again."
Matt LeBlanc, 8th grade student, Berlin, Connecticut
In the spring of 1868 Matty and Tom are graduated from medical school and must decide where they want to settle down. Tom hopes they will go back to Simsbury and take over his father's medical practice but Matty is haunted by her past and longs to return to Kansas. In the end they decide to move to a new town in central Kansas that was founded by Matty's brother, Henry.
From Henry's letters, Matty and Tom have assumed that Rambling is a bustling town but they arrive to discover only seven buildings and fewer than fifty people living there. As they settle in and set up their medical practice, they learn that Henry's dream for a successful town is based more on his hopes than anything else. Matty struggles to help Tom adjust to life on the prairie while she faces old-fashioned ideas about women and resistance to her role as a woman doctor.
An Excerpt from The Town on Rambling Creek:
The sound of crashing glass told me that Henry was coming through the window. As quickly as I could, I cocked my head to see what was happening. Jake turned and fired a shot, hitting Henry in the shoulder. At the same time Tom jumped through the other window and fired his gun. Tom's shot hit Jake's hand, and the man dropped his gun. In an instant, I lunged forward and picked up the weapon.