The Skye's West series originated in the mid-1980s, when my agent, Barbara Puechner, interested Michael Seidman, who was then executive editor of Tor, in a western series that would occupy the time period before settlement of the West. I proposed the series, and it resulted in a three-book contract for original paperbacks. I was going to call it Mister Skye, but the publishers made it Skye's West.

My original thoughts were entirely commercial. I needed a hero who was unique and interesting. Someone not usually seen in the western wilderness. I settled on a pressed British seaman who had jumped ship and made his way into the interior of North America. Barnaby Skye had been yanked off the streets of London as a boy by a press gang and stuffed into the Royal Navy. There he learned about the cruelties of class; how officers called each other Mister, while the rest barely had names at all. So I made Skye a stickler for form: he insisted upon being addressed as "Mister" here in the New World.

Still looking for ways to draw readers to the series, I struck upon the idea of two wives. There was plenty of reality to back up the idea; many tribesmen, especially chiefs and war leaders, had several wives. The wives themselves liked the arrangement because it meant sharing the heavy work, the drudge work that Indian women routinely performed for the household. Thus were born Skye's two wives, the older Victoria of the Absaroka (or Crows) and young Mary of the Shoshones; one wise and testy and very capable, the other beautiful and sexy and warm. That arrangement proved to be a very good commercial feature, and brought many readers to the series. Women especially enjoy the story of a man with two wives; indeed, the series has unusual numbers of female readers.

But I also wanted Skye to be something other than a cardboard hero; we all have vulnerabilities, and these are what make us interesting and what make fictional people absorbing. So Skye was given a problem. He's a binge drinker, who occasionally gets himself into serious trouble out in those dangerous lands. In those periods, his capable wives take over, captaining the parties Skye is guiding.

But I needed still more, and settled upon Skye's amazing horse, Jawbone. He is truly an ugly beast, a blue roan with floppy ears and an awful jaw and miserable head. He is also dangerous, fully capable of killing someone with a ruthless kick. He is also crazy; a horse that plunges into trouble instead of fleeing it, as horses are hard-wired to do.

Thus was my cast of characters born. After that, it was simply a matter of creating interesting parties for Skye to guide into the great unknown west. I also gave him an agent, or sales manager, the sutler at Fort Laramie, who arranges Skye's business for him. The series became largely travel stories, and the titles suggest the destinations of the various parties Skye guides west. There are scientists, missionaries, hunters, army personnel, gamblers, even a party of mail-order brides, all needing safe passage through an unmapped and unsettled land. Or it seemed unmapped and unsettled to the travelers, but to Skye and his wives, it is land settled by their people in the tribes, and well known, and perfectly familiar.

The first novel, Sun River, was followed by Bannack and The Far Tribes. For the first several years I did not know whether it would be a series. That would depend on the sales numbers. They finally gave me a contract for a single book, Yellowstone, and we had to wait still more years to find out whether the series would work. After that, they usually gave me two-book contracts. Meanwhile, I began other series, such as my Santiago Toole novels, which ran to four books. But Skye's West is my only long-term series, and I am grateful for it because it became my bread and butter.

The series has continued since the late eighties and I have written my fifteenth Skye book. I'm debating whether to have him die in the sixteenth and final one, which I will begin this fall. When one reaches my age, one thinks about death, and it may be time to see Skye saying goodbye to the world. He's changed over the years, just as I've changed. As I grew older, so did my perception of my hero, and my current Skyes only superficially resemble the first ones. the current Skye reflects me now as I enter my eighth decade; the earlier Skye reflects me when I was younger. the earlier books reflect Skye's courage; the more recent ones, his integrity and humanity. The first eight were original mass-market paperbacks, but are now available as print-on-demand titles, while the next group were published hardcover first, and then as paperbacks. The series is chronologically confused: the first eight titles featured Skye as a middle-aged man, and occur mainly in the 1850s and 60s; the next group go back to the time when Skye jumped ship in the 1820s, and are the story of the young Skye out in the wilds.

I plan to do sixteen titles in all, and will conclude the series by the end of 2005.