California: Four Months among the Gold-Finders

"California: Four Months among the Gold-Finders: Being the Diary of an Expedition from San Francisco to the Gold Districts" by Henry Vizetelly

The author wrote this book without ever leaving his home in London. Instead he relied on the correspondence and notes taken by Edwin Bryant, a journalist who spent time in California. The main character of this story, while fictional, is based on Bryant's experience in the state during the Gold Rush, mixed in with multiple fictional accounts.