Shortgrass Song

Caleb Holcomb, son of Texas pioneers, spends his youth among the Cheyenne Indians, his adolescence on his father's ranch, and his adulthood as a wandering cowhand and songwriter, while the Texas range country changes from wilderness to whistle-stop

Country music singer Blakely (Vendetta Gold) tells a sweeping saga of a family's struggles on the Western frontier. Ab Holcomb, a hero in the Mexican War, settles in the Pike's Peak region of Colorado, where he and his family must be on guard against the elements and potentially hostile Indians. Soon they're joined by Buster, a runaway slave, and Snake Woman, a Comanche captive who was given to the slave in exchange for his harmonica. Buster, a versatile musician, quickly becomes a favorite of the Holcombs' asthmatic son Caleb, whose dreams of becoming a musician are opposed by Ab. Trouble ensues when Snake Woman kidnaps Caleb in an attempt to win back the respect of her people. With a good ear for dialogue and a keen eye for period detail, Blakeley tells of Caleb's rise as a country musician, of Ab's changing fortunes and his struggles to prevent changes in his beloved West. Song lyrics from the times, 1860 to the 1880s, enliven the narrative as actual historical events, such as the Sand Creek Massacre, hover in the background.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Shortly before the Civil War, would-be cattle rancher Ab Holcomb; his wife, Ella; and sons Matthew, Pete, and Caleb cross the Great Plains to Colorado's sprawling Front Range country. In their first years there, Ella dies; Buster, a freed black man, becomes the glue that holds the family together; and Ab, Unionist and Texan-hater, loses a leg fighting the Confederates in New Mexico. In the 1870s and 1880s, the Holcombs become powerful ranchers until land-hungry homesteaders subdivide the open range. Blakely (The Snowy Range Gang, Evans, 1992) delivers an oft-told tale of the Old West, but this particular family saga proves more than ordinary due to strong, vivid writing. At tale's end, Ab and Buster are rich men, Matthew and Pete are dead, and Caleb has become a trou-badour and drifter. A good buy for most public libraries.
James B. Hemesath, Adams State Coll. Lib., Alamosa, Col.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.