Customer Reviews

Bone Rattler: A Mystery of Colonial America

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(7)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

In BONE RATTLER, Pattison writes a brilliant suspense novel that includes insights about the founding of our country, as well as the spiritual nature of both Native Americans and the persecuted minorities like the Scots who fled to these shores for refuge, freedom and a new life. These disenfranchised people had to make up justice on the early frontier even though they did not speak the same language, share similar cultures or espouse the same religious views. How did this happen uniquely in pre-colonial America? The crimes in this mystery encompass people from several distinct cultures (Scottish, English, Huron, French, Iroquois, Dutch, German, Quaker, Jesuit etc). BONE RATTLER focuses on the heroism inherent in maintaining identity or culture in the face of great trials; the sacrifices made by the founders of our country; and also the question of what law and justice mean and how they can be developed and preserved. This novel truly is leagues beyond the average mystery! It is hard to imagine a subject more relevant in our contemporary world than how democracy can be created, and how disparate tribes and peoples can communicate with and get along with one another. To have woven all of this into a fasciating mystery is a triumph.

Let me say it straight out-the first 20 pages are really tough. I had a hard time figuring out what was going on. But I forced myself to continue and it was worth the effort.
Pattison's brillant tale of mystery and muder set during the French & Indian Wars deserves your attention. At a time when American's struggle to understand the Muslim world, Pattison takes us back to another time of cultures crossing: Native American's versus European settlers. Here we face the Europeans trying to grasp the religion and religious symbols of the culture they cross-with deadly consequences.
Good and evil, man's mistreatment f his fellow man are simple story lines. But when you add the lost culture of the Native A merican's who inhabited the area north of New York City massive lessons can be learned. The significance of the geogrpahy, so close to the World Trade Centers, should not be lost on any reader.
I do not try to summatize the book. I leave that to others. But if you want a great read with lots to learn, pick up Bone Rattler!

A Scots prisoner en route to America during the French & Indian War is asked to employ his medical training to investigate a killing onboard ship that continues as he encounters more violence in the colonies. I usually love historical thrillers, and this one started out well, but gets bogged down as the hero pores over the same clues again and again. There's admirable detail in the impassioned histories of the characters, and good insight into the period, but the proceedings are a bit exhausting, certainly overlong. (Plus, it's pretty obvious in this day and age that the native Americans are not going to be depicted as the bloody savages that they're talked about here for the first two-thirds, and these prejudices will be proved wrong. Which is all right and proper - but it does put the reader ahead of the curve suspense-wise)

I was surprised and disappointed in this book. I have really enjoyed all Pattison's Tibetan mysteries, but his attempt at the same techniques in a very different venue fall sadly flat. The lack of cohesiveness and characters' refusal to answer direct questions with intelligible answers, which add to the ambience of the Tibetan novels, is inappropriate in a much less spirit-based society, and really is just annoying. I kept wanting to say, "Just ASK, you dolt!" And "Answer the question already!"

All in all, simply disappointing; I'm glad I bought it second-hand.

A lover of history and historical fiction, I thought this book was right up my alley. Some books take 20 or so pages to get into, but after slogging through more than 200 pages of this rambling novel, I finally gave up. It read like a riddle upon a riddle throughout, and I got to the point where I just didn't care anymore -- about the characters, who seemed made of cardboard and, in some cases, tissue paper, or about the resolution. Like another reviewer, I thought about drawing up my own cast of characters, which the author should have done, but that didn't seem worth the effort either.

The Bone Rattler introduces us to a very American hero at one of the most fascinating periods of U.S. history, the years leading up to the French and Indian War and the complexity of that conflict. Among other things, the book will remind us of what is seldom taught in our history textbooks, that the political organization of the Iroquois nations was a model for the thinkers of the Enlightenment and in turn for our own system of government. That aside, this is a mystery and a detective story, taking place on a prison ship and in the forest lands of New York state. Duncan McCallum is an apt hero and the true story of the affinity between Highland Scots and the woodland tribes of North America is fascinating. The action does take some time to get established, but once on North American soil the plot develops well with intrigue on many levels. Sarah Ramsey is a very satisfactory heroine and the relationship between Duncan and his missing brother adds another element. This is the first of a series. Strongly recommend.

Eliot Pattison is well known for his award-winning Inspector Shun Tao Yun series ("The Skull Mantra" etc.). With "Bone Rattler" he moves from present-day Tibet to the Colonial American. The well-researched and beautifully-crafted story begins with Scottish prisoners aboard a British convict ship in 1759, moves to New York territory during the French and Indian War. Mr. Pattison avoids cliche and stereotype in his characters, and gives some fascinating examples of European expectations of American Indians and their relations with settlers as opposed to the actual relationships encountered. All this gives considerable depth to a great read full of adventure at sea and on the Colonial American frontier.

#1 Duncan McCallum mystery set in Colonial America, New York state of 1750's. Duncan is a Highland Scot, once training as a doctor, now an indentured servant to the Ramsey Company, plucked from prison (where he was put for supposedly aiding the Highland rebellion) to go to the new world. When the new tutor to the Ramsey children is murdered on board the ship heading to America, Duncan is bullied into taking his place. He does so fearfully, having received a mysterious warning from his friend Adam who died a few days previously, and also a posthumous warning from the tutor himself in the form of cryptic messages.

Once he gets to the new world, Duncan begins to see just what the Ramsey Company is up to--at odds with the military and the Native American tribes, Lord Ramsey seeks to turn his portion of the world into another kingdom where he has all the control and power, and sets various factions against one another to make it so.

This was a wonderful book, although I can say it won't be for everyone. There are a lot of mystical elements to it, especially featuring Native American spirituality as well as the myths and old religion of the Scottish Highlands intermingled. It's a thick, meaty, literary mystery with lots of lush prose and a tangled plot, many interesting characters.

While this is neither my favorite time or place historically, aside from a few slow spots where it seemed to take forever for things to move forward, I really enjoyed this mystery and look forward to the next one in the series.

This colonial America mystery, Bone Rattler, is a riveting read from beginning to end. Eliot Pattison weaves a powerful story of the battle between European superpower forces, France and England, and their Native American counterparts, especially the Iroquois and Huron, in a struggle for dominance; one to dominate the new land and take possession by force or guile; the other to retain a traditional, at times sacred or profane, way of life. These two worlds clash inevitably on a disenfranchised class, the conscripted Scots Highlanders who were broken at Culloden Moor. And therein lies a powerful tale.

Bone Rattler is plot driven by a murder mystery: why are men dying mysteriously aboard the transport ship to America, and again upon reaching New York? And this is interesting as mysteries go, trying to untangle tantalizing clues, like bread crumbs left on the forest trail. But soon this becomes overwhelmed by a more powerful story, of Clan McCallum and the Highlander conscripts pitted against the English crown and armies, and the Ramsey Company. But then it goes deeper, into the forest lore of the Native Indians, further reflected in the ancient lore of the Highlanders, who find connecting lines where the two are not so different. And now the story is driven by this conflict between the Old World and the New, on many levels. Pattison captures this conflict masterfully, all woven into the murder mystery at bottom of this whole tale. At times reading it, I felt as if I were reading a stream of consciousness, something of Joyce, even a love story; but at other times I was thrown fully into the North American forest, where I could almost smell the loam and distant campfire. Eliot must know the woods, because the sense of the forest is like being there. A great read.

I cannot give this book anything less than five star. It was a fabulous read, difficult to put down. And since this was my first introduction to Eliot's work, I cannot wait to read another. Well done!

I too struggled with the first few pages of this mystery of Colonial America but, based on my deep appreciation for the Inspector Shan series, I stuck with this novel and was richly rewarded by its insight into this desperate time.

The similarities between Inspector Shan and Duncan McCallum are obvious. Each is confronted with a mystery they must solve. Each is a refugee from his own land and each discovers amazing new insights when exposed to a native culture they knew nothing about. Where Shan has Gendun and Lokesh, McCallum has Conawago who teaches the young Scot how to look at the world in a completely new light, one at odds with the dominant British/European culture.

Unlike many/most modern mystery novels, Bone Rattler is not an easy read. But it is so richly rewarding that it is well worth the effort and patience it takes to uncover the many layers of a Pattison novel. An extra bonus for me was Pattison's exploration of the results of the Act of Proscription that led to great misery for Highland Scots and resulted in a number of atrocities. Those of us with Scottish ancestors still harbor within our genes this unresolved conflict.