And, for those of you running an ad blocker, here's the cover image:
From "A Dash for the Timber"
by Frederic Sackrider Remington
And here's the link; if you click on this link and then buy the book, I get a small (2.3%) referral fee. This is not a huge income thing for me; I made $1.63 during the last quarter of 2019, but evidently, I'm still supposed to disclose that lest people think me unethical.
A condensed form of the review can be found on Goodreads and on Amazon; the Amazon review will let you vote on it, which I hope you will do. If I remember, I'll post a link to the Amazon review in the comments. CHANGED MY PLAN! Here's the Amazon review.
Greetings to all my internet friends and neighbors, who are providing me with encouragement to return to the Days of Review without clamor or threats. And to any of my family checking in, really sorry I didn't get down to Macon this week, but the glass splinters in the dough for the candy rice balls was that one final detail that shut me down. I'll try again later.
It was indeed a fortuitous day when Peter Grant immigrated to this country. Based on what details he has chosen to reveal, he had already seen and done more than most could ever imagine, on the African continent and perhaps elsewhere, and he used his life experiences as a prison chaplain; you REALLY should read "Walls, Wires, Bars, and Souls" if you'd like to get a sense of what it means to be an authentic Christian, ministering to damaged men in a damaged prison system.
Grant is also one of the great geniuses of our times, which he demonstrated by marrying an Alaskan bush pilot. Where else could you get such a combination of steel nerves, insanity, attention to detail, and spirit of adventure? It's all wrapped up in the rather petite package we know as Dorothy, and if we seek her out for basic and advanced independent book marketing helps, rather than book a trip to Moose Droppings, it's only reflective of our limitations, not hers. She is quite an author as well, and together they appear to have one of those great marriage-chemistry things going, where the total is far more than the sum of the parts.
"Gold on the Hoof" is the third (of four, so far) of the books in the "Ames Archive" series. It was released on August 26, 2019, and I grabbed a copy IMMEDIATELY, and read it as soon as I could get to it. And there, progress ended, alas. I'll not go into detail about the reasons for the pathetically long delay associated with this review, but O My Best Beloved, it is through no fault whatsoever of the book.
In fact, let me open this review by saying that the very best of the literature of the Old West is found here, absent features that might make reading those stories painful for the modern reader. FEAR NOT, though; this is NOT de-constructed, revisionist work, written solely for the benefit of those who wish to re-write history.
Specifically, here are some things you won't find: a pretense that there was no lingering racial prejudice after the Civil War; the idea that the life of the aboriginal people of the American West was one of bliss and harmony with nature, until the white man came along; that all it took was hard work and a plow for frontier life to be idyllic. Furthermore, the real, unavoidable conflicts between a nomadic hunter-gatherer culture and that of the incoming farmers and ranchers is treated seriously, and sympathetically. This entire series is like that, which makes it the best treatment I have come across.
Walt Ames is a former Confederate soldier, who came West after the Civil War. Good fortune provided him with working capital, which he increased buying surplus, obsolete military weapons and refitting them to meet more current standards. He also recognized the need for reliable freight handling, and built up a good shipping business. Not without opposition, he lost a hand and a much-loved wife, Rose, to the bad guys in the process. They all paid with their lives, and forfeited their substantial takings to Walt.
Setting Walt apart from the robber-baron mentality of the super-exploiters is his easy-minded commitment to treating people with fairness. As a result, he has inspired great loyalty among his employees and associates. This quality is what allows him to turn the windfalls he receives along the way into solid working capital, and permits him to launch new businesses.
The economics of his decisions are explained in enough detail to show that this is a plausible story; and, if Walt DOES stumble upon a few pots of gold at the end of rainbows, it always makes sense as to why those pots are there in the first place. In any event, his business plans are always based on hard-headed research and meeting real needs of real people, not "and hope we get lucky."
The core of the story is Walt's trip down to Mexico to buy good horses to sell to the Army, and for his own use. This permits some good discussion about the short-sighted practices of the past, which captured the best of the wild horses descended from those abandoned in the West by the Spanish, and left the culls to breed. That program has now resulted in only a very few good quality horses being available for captures, whereas in the past, many more would have been found.
That's not the only example of the good research that went into the story; there is a nicely-done discussion of the economics of payment with government greenback dollars, not backed by specie, contrasted with payment in gold. As mentioned earlier, there is also a quite sympathetic treatment of the real collision of the way of life followed by the tribes which followed the buffalo herds, and the increasing violations of the territory set aside for them by buffalo hunters who were getting rich by selling hides. It's not ignored that the custom of following the herds is also what makes it feasible for raids between tribes, a hobby now expanded to prey on settlers moving west. And, we even learn how to cook a turkey without plucking it, so we can eat it for breakfast.
Grant's depiction of Walt Ames is NOT that of a superman. Yes, he DOES get lucky from time to time, but he also has placed himself in condition to take advantage of luck when it presents. There is absolutely NOTHING else about the character that makes him a ....oops...what is the male equivalent of a Mary Sue? At any rate, he is NOT an impossible character. His sole defining quality is that of keeping faith, or, in doing unto others as he would have them do unto him. This keeps him (mostly) out of those interminable semi-Hamlet moments that seem to pop up everywhere in hero stories, where the hero has to berate himself on the horrid choices he has to make. Walt isn't immune to a bit of that; he does wonder if there were anything he could have done differently to prevent the murder of Rose. However, he makes his life plan VERY clear, in a small jewel of a conversation he has with Jimmy and Randy, two teen boys who are along for the trip to help with the gear and stock:
“Just remember – don’t go tryin’ to take a fight to anyone who doesn’t really need it. He gets a vote, too, an’ he may be better with a gun than you are. You don’t want to find that out the hard way unless you got no other choice.”
(Grant, Peter. Gold on the Hoof (Ames Archives Book 3) . Sedgefield Press. Kindle Edition. )
I found this to be a VERY restful and absorbing read; Chaplain Pearce, you'd like this one. I wasn't really seeking "comforting" when started the re-read (which was necessary after all these months), but I surely did need what "Gold on the Hoof" brought me.
Well researched; good story; believable characters; recommend without qualification for any age.
Five Stars.
Peace be on your household.
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