From Publishers Weekly
Three-time Spur Award-winning Cherokee storyteller Conley (The Peace Chief) dramatizes the life and exploits of Tsiyu Gansini, the last of the great Cherokee war chiefs, in this stark historical novel. Conley spans more than 100 years in describing his protagonist's life and legacy, beginning with the birth of Gansini, better known as Dragging Canoe, in 1737 and ending when his people endured the infamous Trail of Tears in 1838, nearly five decades after his death. Surviving smallpox as an infant and named, at age 11, when he tries to drag a war canoe into the river to join his father's war party, Dragging Canoe grows to manhood amid the turmoil of the American Revolution as the English, French and American colonists take every opportunity to exploit the Cherokee by making and breaking duplicitous treaties. From his teen years on, Dragging Canoe spends his life fighting to stop the British and Americans from violently reneging on their solemn pledges not to steal his ancestors' lands. After the 1730 Articles of Agreement, the narrative chronicles treaty after treaty, infamy upon infamy and battle after battle, through the heartbreaking dissolution of the proud Cherokee nation. Central to the story is Dragging Canoe's disagreement with his famous cousin, Nancy Ward, whose life Conley chronicled in War Woman. In graphic and sinuous but sometimes meandering prose, this fictionalized biography rings of realism, admirably devoid of "eagle feather and war dance" cliches and indeed any romanticization--despite the author's clear sympathy with the Cherokee--of this brutal period of American history. (Mar.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Conley, author of more than 20 novels and winner of three Western Writers of America Spur Awards, is Cherokee and defends his handling of certain historical figures by reminding us that his is a Cherokee perspective. Reading this vivid tale of "the real people" makes one wish that every tribe had a Conley to represent its point of view. He introduces readers to his forebears in 1737, years before the French and Indian War, touching on everything from Native American culture and tribal politics to the already-growing encroachment by Europeans. With the great war chief Dragging Canoe in charge later in the century, the Cherokees play one group of foreign intruders against another and fight desperately to save their land and their way of life. With his afterword, Conley provides a modern update. He also provides a glossary of Cherokee words and terms. His novel contains a fascinating history lesson, but it's also a whale of a good story.
Budd Arthur
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
