Michael Wallis is the featured author for this year's Auburn One Book One Community event, where he will discuss his newest book, “The Best Land Under Heaven: The Donner Party in the Age of Manifest Destiny.” 

Wallis has spent years retracing the Donner Party’s ill-fated journey, uncovering hundreds of new documents that illuminate how a combination of greed, backbiting, and recklessness led the group to become hopelessly snowbound at the infamous Donner Pass.

Beyond the actual story of the people, the book provides context for the foibles, follies, and often the arrogance of Manifest Destiny.