Customer Reviews

I Rode with Cullen Baker

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Set in the 1860's, I Rode with Cullen Baker is the story of 15 year old Southern girl, Jessica Linville, whose life of privilege is inexorably changed when the Yankees burn down her family's home. Orphaned and alone, and disguised as a boy, she soon gets into trouble and is rescued by the enigmatic Cullen Baker (Cully), a notorious real-life outlaw. Under the protection of Cully, Jess is exposed to a side of life she never knew. Experiencing numerous adventures with him, she soon finds herself falling in love with the larger-than-life outlaw.

Jess is an extremely likeable, if unlikely heroine, a prim and proper young woman who is well educated and mannered, yet not spoiled or arrogant. Cully is the perfect blend of charm and grit, just the sort of scoundrel a sheltered upperclass girl like Jess might fall for. Both characters are skilfully drawn as complex individuals with conflicting needs and a growing tension between them.

Jess is drawn to Cully perhaps because he represents everything that she is not, or perhaps because of the allure of a forbidden love. Colored by her perception of Cully as a knight in shining armor, she's never quite sure-or reluctant to admit-how ruthless he is, or what he might be capable of. The subplot of her growing attraction to him provides a resonance of truth and an intriguing subtext of excitement and danger.

Jess becomes increasingly convinced she can change him, believing that all he needs is the love of a good woman to straighten him out. The attraction isn't wholly one-sided though, and despite Cully's rough nature, he genuinely begins to care for her as well. But other factors, including his shadowy past, ultimately come into play, and their future together becomes questionable.

Told in the first person through Jess's point of view, the prose is eloquently written, crisp and rich in authentic detail. The lean narrative evokes a strong sense of setting and atmosphere, using all the senses to depict a vivid, dynamic world.

The imagery of the cabin and the campfire scenes, the inner thoughts and observations of Jess, the way the story begins so quickly without any wasted words is all evidence of Hartmann's command of her craft.

I Rode with Cullen Baker is an impressive debut novel and excellent reading for all. It deserves far more exposure and a far greater audience than it's likely to get as a POD book.

I Rode With Cullen Baker is a great read and I should know because I have read it several times.Each time I read the book it's like a new experience and I'm right there on the horse hanging on.It's a very descriptive book and easy to read.I wish it could be set in motion. LAR ...PS Keep up the great work RLB Hartmann.

Other reviewers have said it all. I'll just add that I read this in one setting and the story is still in my mind. Jess and Cully are a young couple I won't soon forget. I'd love to see this as a movie.

In "I Rode with Cullen Baker," Ms. Hartmann introduces us to the fifteen-year-old Jessica's innermost thoughts and fears before setting her (and us) on not only the most harrowing but the most intimate adventure of her life.

Civil War times, Jessica orphaned and on the run, rescued by her family-owned black slave Joshua. Joshua quickly turns Jessica into a "Jess," dresses her like a boy - and for all the most commonsensical reasons.

But soon another tragedy piled upon all Jess's many others: Joshua is killed for the color of his skin - and Jess very nearly suffers a similar fate but for a sudden and (to her mind) well-nigh heavenly intervention:

She's been saved and carried off by none other than Cullen Baker, a sort referred to back then as men of ill repute. Jess, however, is hopelessly smitten by "Cully" and commences to heap all the actual good she sees in him against all the bad which she hasn't. Hence, a love story. And as tender a search into a young girl's heart as there ever was.

Curious, though, the power of this one to carry me beyond its mere plot, and even beyond a mere personal relationship with its characters. Curious, too, how deeply I was reminded of the film, "Unforgiven."

Plucked from the film's final moments:

"Some years later, Mrs. Ansonia Feathers made the arduous journey to Hodgeman County to visit the last resting place of her only daughter... And there was nothing on the marker to explain to Mrs. Feathers why her only daughter had married a known thief and murderer, a man of notoriously vicious and intemperate disposition."

But perhaps Mrs. Feathers would have felt a whole lot less confused over the matter if she'd had Cully's Jess to explain it all to her. Which is to say, I'm struck at how perfectly Ms. Hartmann's bitter-sweet little novel might have served as the prequel to that most powerful of films, Unforgiven. And I'm even more struck by the timeless tenacity of our darker and most secretive selves (read archetypes) for peeking over our shoulders. For truly, there's where resides the power of Ms. Hartmann's book: that it challenges us to delve layer after layer after layer... till either we give out or the book does.

Anyway, thanking the author for an exciting tale deeply and exquisitely told. It doesn't get any better than that and somebody oughta tell Hollywood. Prequels are in.

Don't miss this heartfelt tale of adventure and loss of a southern belle escaping through East Texas swamplands.

Miss Jessica Linville of Linville Plantation, Southport, Louisiana lived a genteel and pampered life until the War-Between-the-States began. Miss Jessica's mother had died of fever 6 years before and her father had been killed in action so when her home was ransacked and burned by renegade Yankee soldiers and the servants all ran off, her protector became the lifelong family retainer, Joshua.

Cullen Baker is based on the life of a real-life outlaw and his fictional rescue of Jessica - disguised as Jess - when Joshua is attacked and killed by a mob.

RLB Hartman is a member of Western Writers of America, a novelist, a short story and script writer. First written as a feature script, I Rode With Cullen Baker, was later published by Lulu.com in June 2008 as a softcover novel. Visit the award winning author at his website and view his upcoming works and find out more about his upcoming novels, scripts and stories.

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As I Rode with Cullen Baker opens, we are met with a scene evocative of Gone with the Wind with Tara burning in the background. Set in the South in the midst of the civil war, fifteen year old Jessica Linville watched while the Federal cavalry burned her house to the ground. When I was younger, I used to love a story set in the south during civil war times with a feisty female character at its center, so this book drew my interest immediately. Let me clear one thing up right away, despite my reference to Gone with the Wind, the character of Jessica Linville is nothing like the character of Scarlett O'Hara. Jessica is a proper young lady with manners, a sense of propriety, and has a genuine caring attitude toward her fellow man. And Scarlett had none of those qualities. However, the character of Jessica is a strong one, and she has a strong voice which carries the action of the book as seen through her eyes.

In order to escape the renegades who are taking the very last that Jessica had, Joshua, who has worked for the family Jessica's entire life, hacks off her hair, dresses her in slave clothes, and they run off through the night. Jessica lost her mother six years previously to fever, and her father recently in battle, so she lived with the family servants, all of whom, except for Joshua, ran when the soldiers arrived. Joshua didn't want to let down the memory of her father by running out on her, but did his best to try and get her to safety.

With bluecoats in the wide drive, he'd forced me into the darkness, saying, "We can't stay, Miss Jessica. These renegades would harm you."
Now, silhouettes of a dozen riders trampled the lawns, cheering as my home burned. I threw myself prone in the dirt in despair, and felt the thudding hooves beat like devils' hearts in my chest.
Joshua seemed gone a long time before I saw him returning through the neglected cane rows. Sporadic shouts broke through the diminishing roar of flames, and I prayed that none of those men would notice the hunched figure dodging flickering bands of firelight.
He knelt beside me, gasping, "Here's the shirt you got to put on." Disentangling part of a bundle, he didn't wait for my approval but began tearing at stubborn dress hooks, uncovering me to the chill air.
He slid the correct arm into place as if I were an infant. "Step outen them clothes, shimmy an' all. No-- don't stand up--"
Pushing at the pale green dress material, then the white linen, I stripped to the skin and shoved first one foot, then the other, into the legs of a slave boy's britches. They were limp with being worn, and though I was small for fifteen, tight through the hips. Joshua set a hat, rank with sweat, on my disgraced head, and I realized he was disguising me as a boy.

Unfortunately, the color of Joshua's skin turned out to be a problem in the town where he attempted to send a wire to someone to come and pick up the boy, Jess. In one of the senseless acts that abounded during that time period, a mob of men attempted to lynch Joshua, but then shot him as Jess was trying to remove the rope from around his neck. Before the mob could turn on her, Cullen Baker rode up on his horse, scooped her up, and rode out of town. Thus began Jess's adventure with the notorious outlaw, Cullen Baker.

Although Cully knew from the very start Jess was not a boy, he does not blow her cover, and goes to some lengths to help preserve it because he takes her to the camp of the Independent Rangers, who specialized in pursuing and capturing men who deserted the Confederate Army, but which more often than not took advantage of the fact that most of the men in the Arkansas and Texas areas were away at war, leaving mostly elderly men, women and children. This left the door open for acts of intimidation, rape, theft and violence for groups of well armed men like the Independent Rangers. Jessica's feelings toward Cully are ambivalent. She can't seem to reconcile the fact that he would save and protect her from a mob, but also steals. But then Cully gives the money away.

The next place we stopped was a frame shack that a big wind would blow into Cass County. The rusted tin roof must have leaked considerably, and the cracks where chinking had fallen out were wide enough for a ferret to crawl through. A dirty-faced boy about ten answered the knock. He looked cold, in a thin shirt, trousers which struck his shins two inches above his ankles, and barefoot. Saving his shoes--if he had shoes-- for winter, no doubt. More of the money passed to him. He beamed at Cully and threw a cheerful wave to me. I waved back.
"Consumption," Cully explained, settling himself in the stirrups. "Won't last till Christmas."
I was sorry for the boy, especially because he had to live his short life in such poverty. At least, before the war ruined things, I'd known comfort and plenty and the love of respectable people. "Cully."
"What?"
"Which do you think is worse--to have nice things and lose them, or never to have them in the first place?"
"You tell me," he said shortly, and then we came to a settlement of three houses together, none looking like it could withstand a hard rain. He parted with more currency at all of them.
When we were on our way again, I couldn't help asking, "What will we do for money?"
"There's ways of getting more."
"Stealing it!"
"How the hell else would I get it? You see anybody around here going to give me a job and pay me a wage?"

I Rode with Cullen Baker is a fast paced read, somewhat short in length as is necessary for the target age group. While some of the story line is somewhat predictable, RLB Hartmann spins an engaging tale and keeps the reader turning the pages to find out what happens next. Hartmann uses the historical figure Cullen Baker, and weaves a story set during a time when his whereabouts were unknown, making the story potentially feasible. The Cully in the story is a much more romanticized version of the historical figure than you will find in the Wikipedia information about Cullen Baker. However, it was fun to suspend my disbelief and take a journey back to the south of the civil war times and take a ride with a wild desperado with a not often seen softer side. I think Hartmann's target audience will love the adventure.

Reviewed for the LL Book Review.