A Good Name - Todd Frederick

In 1841, Talbot Green arrives in Mexican California a man with a hidden past and a future yet to be claimed. Fleeing a life of mistakes and regret, he reinvents himself as a shrewd businessman in Monterey, navigating the quickly changing political, military, and economic times. 

Through daring trade ventures, high-stakes negotiations, and a partnership and friendship with the influential Thomas Oliver Larkin, Green rises from outsider to central figure in California's transformation from Mexican territory to U.S. statehood. Along the way, he discovers the power of loyalty, generosity, and love-even as the shadows of his former identity threaten to destroy everything he has built.

A Good Name is a sweeping historical drama of ambition, reinvention, and the costs of the past-a vivid portrait of a man learning that while a name can be borrowed, a truly good name must be earned.