In the tradition of
Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, a
stunningly vivid historical account of the forty-year battle
between Comanche Indians and white settlers for control of the
American West, centering on Quanah, the greatest Comanche chief of
them all.
S. C. Gwynne's Empire of the Summer Moon
spans two astonishing stories. The first traces
the rise and fall of the Comanches, the most powerful Indian tribe
in American history. The second entails one of the most remarkable
narratives ever to come out of the Old West: the epic saga of the
pioneer woman Cynthia Ann Parker and her mixed-blood son Quanah,
who became the last and greatest chief of the Comanches.
Although readers may be more familiar with the tribal names
Apache and Sioux, it was in fact the legendary fighting ability of
the Comanches that determined just how and when the American West
opened up. Comanche boys became adept bareback riders by age six;
full Comanche braves were considered the best horsemen who ever
rode. They were so masterful at war and so skillful with their
arrows and lances that they stopped the northern drive of colonial
Spain from Mexico and halted the French expansion westward from
Louisiana. White settlers arriving in Texas from the eastern United
States were surprised to find the frontier being rolled
backward by Comanches incensed by the invasion of their
tribal lands. So effective were the Comanches that they forced the
creation of the Texas Rangers and account for the advent of the new
weapon specifically designed to fight them: the six-gun.
The war with the Comanches lasted four decades, in effect
holding up the development of the new American nation. Gwynne's
exhilarating account delivers a sweeping narrative that encompasses
Spanish colonialism, the Civil War, the destruction of the buffalo
herds, and the arrival of the railroads-a historical feast for
anyone interested in how the United States came into being.
Against this backdrop Gwynne presents the compelling drama of
Cynthia Ann Parker, a lovely nine-year-old girl with
cornflower-blue eyes who was kidnapped by Comanches from the far
Texas frontier in 1836. She grew to love her captors and became
infamous as the "White Squaw" who refused to return until her
tragic capture by Texas Rangers in 1860. More famous still was her
son Quanah, a warrior who was never defeated and whose guerrilla
wars in the Texas Panhandle made him a legend.
S. C. Gwynne's account of these events is meticulously
researched, intellectually provocative, and, above all, thrillingly
told. Empire of the Summer Moon announces him as a major
new writer of American history.
