Customer Reviews

Black Hills: A Novel

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1 star:		(4)

 

 

In June of 1876, a gifted young Lakota Indian boy named Paha Sapa touches a dying white soldier at the Battle of Little Big Horn, little realizing that he is "counting coup" on the fallen General Custer himself. In that moment, the boy's life changes forever, as the ghost of the slain war leader mysteriously enters his soul, where it will reside, speaking to him at odd moments, for the next sixty-plus years.

Black Hills comes from the vivid imagination of Dan Simmons, author of previous lengthy best-selling historical novels The Terror and Drood. The book is long, entertaining, and wonderfully descriptive, though it lapses into excessive wordiness at times. The epic story encompasses seven decades of Paha Sapa's life and treats the reader to diverse settings ranging from the Black Hills of South Dakota to the "White City" of the Chicago World's Fair. Told in a nonlinear fashion, much of it in present tense, the story can be difficult to follow, particularly toward the beginning of the book before the reader is accustomed to the back-and-forth, decade-skipping flow of the narrative.

The main plot centers around the construction of the Mount Rushmore memorial, carved into a mountain sacred to the Lakota tribe. Paha Sapa signs on as a powderman on the blasting crew, hoping to fulfill a destiny revealed to him as a child in a vision: to stop the wasicus--the white "fat takers"--from destroying the Black Hills. Other story lines include Paha Sapa's wonderful coming of age as a Lakota visionary, a too-brief romantic interlude in Chicago, and the underlying saga of America's growing-up years through the early twentieth century.

The book's key strength, aside from Simmons's often beautiful descriptions of vivid settings, is its imaginative retellings of actual events, most notably the construction of Mount Rushmore. Simmons tips his hat to other key historical events as well, including the building of the Brooklyn Bridge in a well-researched and fascinating chapter. Lakota culture, language, and spirituality is explored throughout.

The book contains a fair amount of language, though most of it fits the settings and characters. Less appropriate are a number of bizarrely and unnecessarily explicit accounts of marital intimacy from the point of view of Custer's ghost.

Unfortunately, like many long books, Black Hills fails to end when it should; the last fifty pages are a strange departure from the lyrical beauty of the rest of the book, as the author launches into a seemingly agenda-driven tirade against humanity's affects on nature.

Overall, however, the book is highly enjoyable and well worth the not inconsiderable time it takes to complete. Flawed yet replete with flashes of brilliance, the book will entertain, educate, and move readers as it delves into the always strained and occasionally beautiful relationship between a nation's past and its future.

Black Hills, by Dan Simmons, begins with Paha Sapa, a young Lakota boy, touching the body of the dying General George Custer at Little Big Horn. In that moment, Custer's spirit enters Paha Sapa's body. It doesn't leave for over sixty years.

Paha Sapa experiences this more than once with people. He has Custer's spirit in his head, but he also can see the pasts and futures of many people he meets, including Crazy Horse. During his initiation ceremony to become a man, Paha Sapa also experiences a terrible vision of the future; four large stone presidents of the United States careening across his beloved Black Hills, eating everything in their sight and leaving all behind them to waste. Paha Sapa grows up as his Lakota family and the other native tribes of the Great Plains die out. He comes to the decision that he must destroy these stone presidents before they destroy his land. So he sets out on a plan to blow up Mt. Rushmore before the monument is complete.

Paha Sapa is a wonderful character; he is so good and so kind and so aware of his culture disintegrating around him. He is a complicated person who hates what the white settlers have done to his land but who also respects and admires their ingenuity and passion. He is one of the most achingly lonely characters I have met in a very long time. He is kind to everyone, but is set apart by his race and by the ghost in his mind and by other people's memories crowding out his own memories. I fell in love with him and his quiet dignity.

I also enjoyed the story and Simmons' storytelling approach. There is a true sense of immediacy for the reader in each chapter. The narrative jumps around a lot, from the 1870s to the 1930s and between Paha Sapa and General Custer. One thing I found odd but eventually grew used to is that all dialogue is done in italics, with a dash in front. There is really never a "he said" in the whole book. This was confusing at first, especially when two characters were talking to each other, but eventually I got used to it. I also was initially confused by the jumping around in the dates, but eventually settled in. I think this book begs for a re-read so that I can appreciate all the subtleties in the writing when I go back, knowing the story's full arc.

Native American history is conveniently swept under the rug in history class; no one wants to hear about how their exalted country decimated an entire population. When Native American history is taught, the tribes are often grouped together as one people, which is unfair. And they are given these almost mystical qualities of defending the planet against the ravages of greedy white people. Simmons doesn't play this card in his novel and I'm happy for it. There are moments of idealism in the book, yes (particularly the last thirty pages or so), but his characters also acknowledge that the tribes of the Great Plains were not perfect. Simmons shows us the emotional toll that westward expansion had on one Lakota man, and how his life was affected by it. It's a very intimate and highly moving portrait. While I think the ending of the book was very protracted, it certainly gave me a lot to think about with regards to the future. And I enjoyed getting a sense of General Custer, though the first few chapters from his point of view were far more erotically charged than I'd ever have expected.

Custer comes alive in this book, and never more than when he speaks of his great love for his wife. And so I greatly appreciate Simmons' novel for reminding me, gently, that a person should not be defined by one battle, or one moment, even though history makes it so easy to do so. Black Hills is a good story, but I like the book because it reminded me that it is too easy to have a vague idea of history that can, quite frankly, be inaccurate. Or at the very least, only tell half the story. Simmons tells two sides of a story here- Paha Sapa's and Custer's, and he does so in a beautiful and empathizing manner. Highly recommended.

You know how in many historical novels, historical facts and details are so intricately woven into the plot that you are barely aware of the author's extensive research? Well, this novel isn't one of those. In "Black Hills," every paragraph, every page screams "Look at all the research I have done!" There apparently isn't a fact that Dan Simmons has uncovered--whether relevant to the plot or not--that he doesn't cram into this book. The mind-boggling detail of minutia is almost laughable in places. Want to know the dimensions and weight and workings of the machinery in the power plant of the Chicago World's Fair? It has absolutely nothing to do with the story, but it's all there. There are hundreds of similar examples, and they all get in the way of an otherwise clever dramatization of Sioux (Lakota) history, Custer's Last Stand, and the building of Mount Rushmore. Dan Simmons has always needed a good editor, but never before like he needs with this novel. There are other annoying elements as well. While Custer's early letters to his wife , as depicted in this novel,may be taken from the real ones Custer wrote, it smacks of gratuitous sex, included because, well, otherwise there'd be no sex in this story. (Apparently love is not enough). Custer's carnal details feel out of place and unnecessary. In fact, all the chapters of Custer's letters feel overwritten and unnecessary. Custer, in real life, was not a person deserving of sympathy. The real story here is about the protagonist, Paha Sapa, and his Lakota heritage, his brief marriage, his progeny, and his work on Mt. Rushmore. The nonsense about Custer's ghost is quite secondary, or should have been. What redeemed this book for me was the ending which, although way too preachy and heavy-handed, tied up loose ends and was quite touching. After finishing this nearly 500-page book (while fighting the urge several times to put it down), I came to realize that about 300 pages of it were really worthwhile.

After enjoying Dan Simmons 'The Terror' and 'Drood' tremendously, I feel let down by this piece of 'historic fiction'. I can honestly say that I have been bored from beginning to end. First, the character of Paha Sapa is rather flat, not really likeable, and definitely not a protagonist I would like to identify with. Then there is the ghost of General Custer, which is at any rate only a nuisance and does not really add any substance to the plot.
The book starts out somewhere in the late 19th century with Paha Sapa still being a boy. In this part up to about a third of the book the reader gets confronted with numerous Sioux terms, which you can't spell or pronounce. There are some passages so overflowing with this very foreign language, that you would rather stop reading, bec. you get confused and have a hard time following, what it is all about. Custer's ghost keeps ranting about sexual encounters with his wife, which might be judged as inappropriate by some readers or just ridiculous and superfluous by others.
If I compare this book to 'The Terror', Black Hills entirely lacks tention and excitement. The story just drags on and on, like reading a history book. Nothing happens, or at least nothing happens that I could care about. The technique of switching the narrative between different times, sometimes telling about the boyhood past, sometimes present (being the 1930s), sometimes in between, does not really help. Also, Paha Sapa's supernatural ability to 'read' a persons memories and future does not help. Paha Sapa is just not a character, you would care about, whatever wonders he might perform. Back to 'The Terror': Here you find Captain Francis Crozier, whom you might not really like, but what a character! What a depth of feeling and thinking... You just want to follow him every step... Paha Sapa? Until the very end I expected there would be something more to this persona. Nothing.
Not wanting to follow the author's example and bore you to death, I conclude that this book is definitely a waste of time and money. Black Hills contains too little of history to be considered a historic novel, and the plot and characters are just too flat to qualify as a good work of fiction.

Having read four previous Dan Simmons novels, I anxiously awaited this 2010 novel. I certainly was not disappointed! This is a imaginative historical novel sprawling over sixty years. In this book, you will meet many well known figures such as: Wild Bill Cody, Crazy Horse, Sitting Bull, and the famous sculptor, Gutzon Borglum. The Lakota indian Paha Sapa and Gen. George Armstrong Custer share the spotlight (and the same body) in this astonishing tale. After reading The Terror and Drood, I didn't think Simmons could write anything more peculiar. Boy, was I wrong.

Each chapter in this book jumps back and forth to different years in Paha Sapa's life. The first starts in 1876 during the battle of Little Big Horn. Paha, a ten year old boy, counts "coup" (touching a enemy unarmed) on Gen. Custer just as the General is killed. Now the unbelievable happens - the General's ghost jumps into Paha's body. The ghost will talk to Paha throughout the book about many things, incuding his sexual escapades with his wife, Libbie. Later, Paha goes on a Hanbleceya, a vision quest , and sees the Wasichus (white men) as giants eating up the land of "The Six Grandfathers", the Black Hills. The struggles of the "natural free human beings" known as the Lakota or Sioux versus the Wasichus is a theme throughout the book.

The book skips to 1893 during the World's Fair in Chicago, back to 1876, and forward to 1936. In 1893 in Chicago, Paha is working in the Wild West show for Bill Cody, and meets his future wife, Rain de Plachette. During this chapter skipping, there is a interesting confrontation with Paha and the construction crew building the Brooklyn Bridge. This happens in 1933 when the ghost persuades Paha to visit Mrs. Custer on her 91st birthday so the General can see his wife for the last time. This is a very funny and also very sad meeting in N.Y.C.

The guts of the book has to do with the project in South Dakota known as Mount Rushmore. Paha gets hired as a powderman for the sculptor Borglum. As the years pass and Paha becomes a explosive expert - his real reason for being there becomes obvious. He wants to blow up the monument! He wants to do it during the unveiling of the Jefferson face, while Franklin D. Roosevelt is in attendance. In Paha's mind, this will stop the Wasichus from destroying the Black Hills and satisfy his vision quest.

Does he succeed? Does Paha Sapa (I love that name) survive? What happens to the President or Gutzon Borglum? Sorry, you will have to read 487 pages of this great novel to find out! I highly recommend this book.

In 2008, at a signing for Dan Simmons' last incredible tome, Drood - as well as in an interview for BookBanter - the bestselling and award-winning author talked about his next novel in progress: the story about a young Native American boy, Paha Sapa, who is possessed by the spirit and soul of General Custer, who recently expired at the Battle of Little Big Horn in 1876. It was a very unique sounding story, which is what Simmons does best, but I was certainly hesitant about the novel it would become, Black Hills. Sadly after the pinnacle of his writing with The Terror, Black Hills is a mediocre at best novel that Simmons clearly put a lot of work into, but at the end leaves the reader thinking: "Is that it?"

The story begins with 10-year-old Paha Sapa visiting the battle ground of Little Big Horn, after the fighting. He comes upon a man lying on the ground; as he investigates, a cloud form of the man's spirit/soul enters his body. Dan Simmons has done his research on Native American ways and culture, as Paha Sapa prepares himself to become a man. His name means Black Hills, named for the specific hills of South Dakota. The story then jumps to 1936 when Paha Sapa is an old man, in his seventies, working on the building and sculpting of Mount Rushmore. Paha Sapa's specific job is demolitions, strategically placing the dynamite to blast the rock. But he considers the building of Rushmore a great insult to his people and his country, and with President Roosevelt scheduled to make a visit in the near future, Paha Sapa has his own celebratory explosion planned.

Black Hills jumps back and forth in time with Paha Sapa's growth as a boy in becoming a man, and then his slow, meticulous planning of the catastrophic explosion of Rushmore as he continues to work on the historical site. At the very end of the book, as the reader is left wondering why things happened the way they did, Simmons launches into a lengthy ethereal commentary about protecting and respecting this land and this world, which simply comes out of nowhere.

Simmons does what he does best with Black Hills: some interesting characters, strong description, good writing; but the story and plot are lacking in development, depth and interest that his other novels always possess. Black Hills is simply not a book for everyone: new readers may enjoy it, some Simmons fans may also, but this reviewer found it to be a weak novel from one of the best writers writing today.

Originally written on May 19 2010 ©Alex C. Telander.

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Now that Dan Simmons has moved into writing historical novels with a parnormal twist (The Terror, Drood) there seems to come a point halfway through his novels where I have to put them down and read something fast, light and insubstantial to clear my head before jumping back in to Simmons' occasionally dense prose and abundance of details. The good news about Black Hills is that I managed to make it straight through the novel without a break.

The bad news is that after enjoying the story, I was befuddled when I came to the end. And the end after that. And then the next end. And so on.

Simmons knows how to write novels, but if there's something he's weak on it's figuring out how to end a story. That weakness is fully on display in Black Hills, the story of a young Lakota boy who is "counting coup" on the dying soldiers at Custer's Last Stand and somehow picks up the ghost of the Custer who would be his constant companion for the next six decades.

The premise was intriguing and Simmons handled it well, jumping back and forth along Paha Sapa's life and the memories of Custer. Likewise, Simmons handled the settings very well - from the Black Hills at various times in history to the Chicago World's Fair to New York in the 1930s where Paha Sapa and his unwilling companion meet the aged widow of Custer to the Mount Rushmore monument where Paha Sapa works setting charges and plans to destroy the sculpture.

But as the book spins out the last threads of the story it seems as though Simmons loses faith in his story and begins hurling endings at the reader in the hope that something will stick. Granted, if Simmons had stopped with the first "ending" most readers would have considered it weak (if not a complete "deus ex machina" cheat). Perhaps Simmons decided to make up for Paha Saha's last minute reprieve as he waits for his death by tacking on endings where he lives, dies, has visions of the past, has visions of the future, etc.

Ninety percent of Black Hills is great. Simmons is a good enough writer to keep the Paha Saha/Custer-sharing-a-body concept from slipping into slapstick or parody like an Old West version of the Steve Martin/Lily Tomlin comedy "All of Me." He's also a good enough writer to hold my interest as the plot jumps back and forth in time. I just wish the last 10 percent of the book could have been up to the same level of the first 90 percent.

The first book I read by Dan Simmons was the newly released Summer Of Night paperback in the early 90's. I then quickly devoured his previous works and was hooked. Simmons instantly became one of a handful of my favorite authors, someone I could trust to tell a great story, whether it was 9 or 900 pages. Over the years I read absolutely everything and was never disappointed. After the last 2 or 3 books I no longer trust Dan Simmons. He has lost the ability to do what seemed to come effortlessly - tell a story that captivates the reader. Simmons seems to write for himself. I always thought that was a good thing for a great artist but it doesn't work for him. His work is meticulously researched to the point where, for large chunks of his latest work, I feel like I am in a classroom. Drood and Black Hills (and to a lesser extent The Terror) suffer from this way too much. There are moments of Dan's great storytelling and then he goes off on an extended discourse on whatever topic he has researched. I feel my eyes glazing over and my attention wandering. Simmons has forgotten that the book is ultimately for the reader, not the writer. It seems as though he has compiled hundreds of pages of research and facts about all manner of things even peripherally related to the subject and is not satisfied until he has plugged in each and every one. Write a story, Dan! Do I need to read 12 pages on this or that piece of ephemera that does not add to the plot? Leave it out! I probably will read the next one and can only hope that things take a turn for the better.

I have read many of Dan Simmons works and have loved them. This one, however, is horrible. I read, I struggled to read more and finally I gave up feeling disappointed and let down. lt is overburdened by unnecessary detail, poorly written and weakly plotted. Usually when I read one of his novels I can't wait for the next page. Not so in this case. I slogged through about half of it and finally gave up. Oh well. If you are new to Dan Simmons work, don't read Black Hills first. He is much better than this.

This is a truly excellent novel. I have read many of the author's books and this ranks right up there with the best. The description of the book as a historical novel with a "fantastic twist" is an accurate one. In the main character of Paha Sapa-a Sioux shaman-Simmons has created a truly classic character.

In his journey through life Paha Sapa interacts with Crazy Horse, Sitting Bull, Wild Bill Cody, Sculptor Bourghlam of Mount Rushmore fame as well as a host of other real life characters in addition to of course Colonel Custer.(The ghost of Custer is a rather one dimensional character who remembers in vivid details his sex life with beloved wife Libby and adds only minimally to the story as far as I am concerned.)

There is a great deal of detail about the Lakota way of life including of course the spirit world which Paha Sapa so clearly is deeply involved in. This aspect of the book really is central to the novel and is very well done, including much use of the Lakota language. Anyone with an interest in the Sioux culture would enjoy the book for this reason alone.

The spiritual or fantastic elements of the story revolve around Sioux mythology and Paha Sapa's ability to see the future of his people as well as individual's after physical contact with them. There is also a comparison made of Native American icons and those of the white man which are also central to the book-and ultimately I think Simmons makes it clear there is value in both cultures-a point not always recognized in books dealing with Native American culture.

All in all a great book which will be enjoyed by Simmons fans, people interested in the Black Hills and the Lakota, and people interested in the history of the area at the end of the 1800's and the beginning of the 1900's. Very well done!