Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Growing up in North Texas, and as a big fan of historical fiction, I really wanted to like this book. Unfortunately, I really, really did not. The book is about an old man / war hero who escorts a young girl (Johanna) back to her family. Johanna's parents were killed, and she kidnapped, at age 6 by Kiowa Native Americans. She was (unwillingly) returned to her extended family at age 10. Every character in the story is either a white hat (war hero, family man) or a black hat (pimp for child prostitutes) - there isn't any moral ambiguity, which makes the story dull and unrealistic. This girl has gone through a deeply traumatic experience, but every conflict between her native upbringing and white society's expectations is presented as a funny anecdote. (For example - she kills and steals 2 chickens, and feels proud that she has provided breakfast, while the Old Man is horrified). The author relies heavily on the trope of native american as a "noble savage." Rather than developing characters emotionally, she relies on one's natural sympathy for a lonely old man and an orphaned child. The girl very quick develops an attachment and trust with the old man, which kind of comes out of the blue. It's the emotional crux of the story, but never seemed realistic. I found it hard to really care about what was happening to the characters. Each chapter, the author also introduced another 2-3 tertiary characters, spending a lot of time on their backstory, only for them to have little action / purpose in the chapter and no significance in the broader story. Basically the entire story lacked both emotional depth and realism. If you enjoyed old TV westerns, you'd probably enjoy this book for the same reasons - it's light weight entertainment. In it's stead, I would highly recommend "Empire of the Summer Moon."