BEST Book you are ever going to read about the west...PERIOD

[rbertalotto]

I read two books a month. For the last two years I've been reading everything I can beg, borrow and steal about the old west. From 1830-1900 is the period that most interests me.

Many of the books I've read are excellent, but nothing compares to "Empire of the Summer Moon" by S.C.Gwynne

This is the story of Quanah Parker and the rise and fall of the Comanches.

It even gets into discission about the firearms of the time and how the Winchester realy did win the west!

I can not recommend it more highly.

[KirkD]

Thanks for that info. I'll look forward to reading it.

[AJMD429]

Added to my 'wish list'...

[Ysabel Kid]

Me too!

[earlmck]

Putting that one on the read list, Roy. Thanks for the tip.

[DixieBoy]

I will second that recommendation. Sounds like rbertalotto and me have very similar reading interests.

During an average month I'm burning through 4 or 5 books on the Old West a month, but it sometimes goes slower because I take notes. Yeah, for real. Been working on a book idea for a few years and when I can find sourced information I get real excited.

Anyway, I've read just about everything about the Comanches and 1820's through 1920's Texas that I can get my hands on. For real detail, Stephen Moore's Savage Frontier series (there are 4 volumes) covers 2 to 3 years in a single volume. I've read Vol. 1 and Vol. 4 and still have to get Vol. 2 and 3. Read Rip Ford's Texas (very good), Noah Smithwick's Evolution of a State (good, but rambling), Walter Prescott Webb's Texas Rangers: A Century of Frontier Defense, Fehrenbach's The Comanches, and many more.

This book Empire of the Summer Moon was a real surprise. It's gotten a lot of "critical acclaim" which, to me, usually means a book is going to stink, because it's layered with political correctness. I put off reading S.C. Gwynne's book for a while and finally decided to give it a shot. Inside of the first dozen pages I was amazed. This guy can write, and he doesn't fall all over himself making excuses for the settlers of Texas coming to that land (after all, the Comanche had come from northwest of Texas, and had killed off and/or displaced many native Texas tribes). Neither does he try to sugarcoat the Comanche and Kiowa enjoyment of a good old fashioned killing raid, or the rape of women captives. He tells it like it was, which is all I want from an author. Not a lot of politically correct hogwash. The Empire of the Summer Moon was an absolute surprise to me in other ways too.

If you've read much about Texas history, the Comanche, and the Texan-Comanche Wars you will re-walk the same ground the more you read about these subjects. That's inevitable. Usually, it's new details I'm interested in, or finding the words of a participant in one of the events that you hadn't come across before. Well, in Gwynne's book, I actually learned many things I did not know. And much of this new stuff is sourced, so that if you want to dig deeper on your own, you have the source material to guide you. I can't ask for more than that. My only "complaint" is that this underemployed guy (ME!) now has a couple dozen more books (at least) that I have to get my hands on, because his citations are good. That's no complaint at all. That's juice running from a good steak.

The Empire of the Summer Moon is the best book I've read in a year, maybe more. When a guy who can write gets onto a story that's compelling anyway, you have the makings of a winner. I recommend this book to all of you guys who love the Old West and a great story, well told. Good call rbertalotto. - DixieBoy

[olyinaz]

Sold!

Oly

[rbertalotto]

Maybe we should take all of our books on the west and start
a book club loner library!

Great review!

[kragluver]

I 100% agree. Empire is a fantastic book. Anyone even mildly interested in the Comanche wars in Texas will find it fascinating.

[JohnB]

I just picked up my copy from the library today....had to check in on the campfire before I check out for bed and to start reading....

I am already stoked and I just read the back cover...

[DixieBoy]

Not to "give anything away" because there are mountains of things you'll learn in this book, but one thing that I've been particularly interested in for a long time, concerning the Indian Wars.

There were laws against selling guns to the Indians going back to Jefferson's days. Yet, there were post traders who were licensed by the government and many of these did, indeed, sell guns to the Indians. The Medicine Lodge Treaty of 1867 supposedly made allowances for the Indians to have annuities (payments) in exchange for moving onto reservations and giving up their free roaming ways. I've researched that treaty a bit, and have yet to find specific language that states anything in black and white about giving guns to the Indians. Yet, the Comanche and their buddies the Kiowas did indeed get guns - good ones - from "the agencies" as they called the headquarters buildings for the reservations. Some of the men in charge of the agencies, like Lawrie Tatum at the Kiowa-Comanche agency were believed to have issued guns because the government was often late with the food which was promised in the treaties. So, the guns were to help the Indians have successful "hunts" so that they wouldn't starve. Well, the Indians "hunted" alright.

I've got another book somewhere, I think it might be Rip Ford's Texas, where a settler is testifying in a letter to the government. He witnessed the murder of most of his family, hidden - unarmed himself - in tall grass, and he was close enough to see that the Indians who were raiding, and killing in homesteads all along the frontier were using brand new Spencer rifles. The Indians had gotten these rifles from the agency, for "hunting." Yeah, they were hunting alright. Hunting Texans, families, women, children, anybody.

The fury of the settlers at the fact that their own government was arming the Indians, and beyond that, giving the Indians safe harbor after they'd finished raiding, well, you can imagine how furious the Texas settlers were. All these "agencies" were in what is now Oklahoma, the southwest corner of the old Indian Territory. They'd use that as home base, raid, kill, take scalps, and then return to the safety of the agency. The army was not allowed to pursue raiders into the reservation boundaries. That was official policy. Unreal. Just unreal.

Anyway, this is one great book. All of you guys who give it a read are in for a treat. - DixieBoy

[CarlsenHighway]

I read it too, only a couple of months back, and it was truly excellent. The guy that write it did a very good non-fiction treatment. (Wish I remembred his name, I will have to look for his other books) I highly recommend it to all.

[2571]

Kinda behind times, aren't you? This book has been on the market for quite a while. It's even been out as an audio book for a year. These kinds of accolades have been available to the reading public for a LONG time.

Many abriginal Americans have mixed feeling about Ol' Uncle Quanah.

Good book, other than that, though.

I've been re-reading Son of the Morning Star

[Bill in Oregon]

I read it last spring, and passed it on. My great grandfather had a ranch on the Canadian River just upstream from Adobe Walls, and knew both Quanah Parker and Billy Dixon. Someday I'd like to re-visit the Plains-Panhandle Museum in Canyon City. Have yet to visit Palo Duro Canyon.

[Topside]

Just returned from the Library with the 12 cd audio rendition. Loadin' it on the ipod to listen to on upcoming trip. Don't know if I'll like it as well as reading it but it should make the miles pass a little quicker.
T.

[Paladin]

Added to my 'wish list'...

+1, Thanks

[rbertalotto]

Kinda behind times, aren't you? This book has been on the market for quite a while. It's even been out as an audio book for a year. These kinds of accolades have been available to the reading public for a LONG time.

OK, so NO discussion of Moby Dick, Grapes of Wrath or any other book older than a few mionths old?............I just want to know what the rules are over here.......

[t.r.]

I highly recommend this book:

Give Your Heart to the Hawks: A Tribute to the Mountain Men by Win Blevins.

TR

[Sixgun]

Dang! How do you guys get time to read? I read plenty of gun rags and such and its almost always on the "throne". I very seldom have time to sit down and read. I can't go 15 minutes without something needing my attention and I don't talk on the phone (long) or watch much tv. Gotta figure out a way to cram 30 hours in a day.

Even this computer thingy, 15 minutes here, maybe 20 minutes there.--------Sixgun

[DixieBoy]

Well for me, I purposely didn't read the book for a while. It had almost too much "critical acclaim," and in my experience that has often meant a book is rotten with political correctness. I had this book here for almost a year before I gave it a chance. Very glad I did.

Don't want to steer this thread off course, but for those of you guys who like real history but insist on an interesting read, AND you are interested in 1870's Africa, there is another book which I believe is in the same league as Empire of the Summer Moon.

This book is titled Into Africa, and is written by Martin Dugard. It is the story of "Doctor Livingston, I presume?"
The epic story of Stanley and Livingston, but so much more ... You'll get a great glimpse into Henry Morton Stanley, the reporter who also spent much time in the American West during the earlier 1870's, and wrote some thrilling accounts of events he personally witnessed during the Indian Wars. Doctor Livingston, his quest to discover the source of the River Nile, and what the whole "Dark Continent" business was all about (the term "the dark continent" had nothing to do with race; it was literally the central portion of Africa which had never been explored by Europeans, and was left either dark or whited out in period maps of Africa). The intense competition among several British explorer/adventurers is detailed, in their quest to be the first to find "the source" - the origin of the Nile, and also to map those areas of Africa which had never been explored by Europeans, and in a thrilling way. You end up with a great story, and just a little ways into the book you realize that you're learning history the way I've always believed it is best taught : through the telling of great stories. That way it sticks with you, and you're not slogging through some dull text. Instead, you're actually anxious to get the time to savor another dozen or two pages each night. This one is really a treat. Check it out. Sorry to have strayed from the Old West here, but hey, Stanley spent some real serious time out there too, so that makes this sort of fit in here.

You want tales of adventure, discovery, 1870's Africa, some of the early African hunters, tribal wars, trekking through hundreds of miles of tropical jungles with rebellious native porters, encounters with African slave hunters (this was in the mid 1870's !), and more fascinating adventures than you'll usually find in a dozen books ? Check this one out too. - DixieBoy

[Hombre]

Me too, really love to read books about the american west.
Have already a few books about Quanah Parker but on your recommendation, rbertalotto, I just ordered
"Empire of the summer moon". Shall be really interesting to read it.
Got a book yesterday which I think will be a very interesting read and that is "He rode with Butch and Sundance:The story of Harvey "Kid Curry" Logan" by Mark Smokov. Stories about the persons involved in the so called "Wild Bunch" I think is also very intersting.
As a person living in Sweden it has been very difficult to order books from the U.S.A but then came internet and now it is maybe a little bit too easy.
I am always looking for good books about the american west and I am almost interested in everything in it so I really appreciate book recommendations.

Stefan
Sweden