Following a recommendation from his agent, author William Heath used all of his research from his novel, Blacksnake's Path: The True Adventures of William Wells, to write the straight, full history in a second novel. Using education, training, and skills as a novelist, Heath discovered that he could write really good narrative history. William Wells and the Struggle for the Old Northwest was immediately accepted by a small press for publishing and won several awards and nominations that honor writers for distinguished writing about the American West.