Synopsis
Set in the Cherokee Nation not long after the Civil War, Zeke and Ned is the story of Ezekiel Proctor and Ned Christie, the last Cherokee warriors, living men whose story is not merely legend, but history - their fates a consequence of the brutal policies which produced the Trail of Tears.
In their second collaborative novel, McMurtry and Ossana introduce many characters whose stories are woven together with a skill that will remind the reader of Lonesome Dove.
Reviews
A romping, stomping time is offered in McMurtry's latest shoot-'em-up, the second in collaboration with Ossana, their first being Pretty Boy Floyd (1994). In the Oklahoma Terrritory, as the nineteenth century enters its final stretch, the bullet is the deliverer of frontier justice and injustice. Two Native Americans, Zeke Proctor and Ned Christie, find themselves on the wrong side of the law--the law of white folks, that is--and as desperadoes in the eyes of some and as heroes in the eyes of others, they take their stands and fight to the finish. With a simple but simply eloquent style--"He looked miserable as a wet dog on a cold day" --the authors fashion two main characters and a sizable number of secondary ones, showing considerable affection and nuance and displaying as much knowledge of the time period as skill in composing a fast-paced narrative. Superb popular fiction that is bound to be heavily requested. Brad Hooper
McMurty and Ossana employ a technique they used successfully in Pretty Boy Floyd (LJ 9/1/94), in which a historical character of legendary proportions become the hero of a modern work of fiction. This work focuses on Zeke Proctor and Ned Christic, Cherokee Indians who became folk heroes in the Oklahoma Territory during the 1890s. Unforgiven wrongs that festered since the removal of the Cherokee Nation from Georgia in the 1830s become a moving force in the story of a casual love affair gone awry and the bloody feud and even bloodier legal actions that transpire when federal judges intervene. McMurty paints Zeke's courtship, murder trial, and marriage debacle with broad humor, and Ossana takes the story home with Ned's four-year standoff of armed federal marshals dispatched to take him dead or alive. A wonderfully readable historical novel that furthers the understanding of the Native-white disputes of the last century. Recommended for most collections.
-?Thomas L. Kilpatrick, Southern Illinois Univ. Lib., Carbondale, Ill.
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