I've never been to Texas and have never had much desire to even visit the state, admittedly exposing my Yankee upbringing.   Other than Lance Armstrong and Molly Ivins I've pretty much ignored the Lone Star State.   It wasn't until I read Empire of the Summer Moon that I developed an appreciation for the fact that of all the states in the US of A, Texas may have the most fascinating history.   The interaction of the Spanish and Mexicans from the south, Native Americans from the west and the English Americans from the east made for a culturally intriguing and violently complicated combination.

Author S.C. Gwynne - former editor at Time magazine and Austin resident - tells the story from the perspective of the Comanche, a nomadic warrior tribe of natives who made their living hunting bison, following massive herds all over the southern Great Plains.  Utilizing nothing more than Stone Age technology and an exquisite mastery of horses, they came to dominate most of the current states of Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, New Mexico and Colorado.   Unfortunately for the cause of peace, their rise to power coincided with the aggressive expansion of the United States from the east, making for an inevitably brutal conflict. 

Gwynne chooses to focus on Quanah Parker, the talented and charismatic "mixed-blood" son of Cynthia Ann Parker, a white woman who was raised by the Comanche after they kidnapped her at age nine, having killed most of her family in a notorious raid on the Parker ranch in 1836.   He would go on to become the last and greatest leader of the Comanche, becoming a late 19th century celebrity after he finally surrendered to federal government.   

Gwynne's version of history doesn't take the well-trodden path of Native Americans as pure victims of a cruel and technologically superior European culture.  He portrays the Comanche as quite possibly the most horrifically brutal and violent warrior culture in the history of humankind.  When they weren't committing atrocities on relatively defenseless Texas homesteaders they were mercilessly destroying neighboring Apache or Tonkawa camps.   At the same time, he makes it entirely clear that the European settlers and US government were dead set on genocide.   What I find most fascinating is that Manifest Destiny almost failed.  The white settlers and their supporting government forces were so completely outmatched by the Comanche's superior war making that the natives could have succeeded at holding their vast bison-filled territory indefinitely were it not for two small flukes of history: the devastating infectious diseases that the settlers brought with them and the invention of the Colt revolver. 

Over three hundred pages of meticulously referenced history, Gwynne tells a riveting and gruesome tale, never once sugar-coating a massacre or an act of violence.   Revealing an impressive journalistic flare, he weaves a vast amount of complicated information into a very entertaining read.  It's the kind of book that makes me want to take a couple days off just to read it from cover to cover. 

Spanning from the Comanche's initial interaction with the Spanish conquistadores, to the ascendance of the Texas Rangers, to Quanah Parker's purchase of an automobile in the early 20th century; Empire of the Summer Moon is an expertly and objectively told piece of western American history.   I find it interesting to think about how long it takes for history to truly become objective.   Given that we still spend time arguing about what Thomas Jefferson thought, it may still be a few decades - or centuries - before we can talk about American Indian, African American or Civil War history without obscuring events with emotion and hyperbole.  I give this refreshing attempt at historical impartiality a strong recommendation for any reader with an interest in western American history. 



The history buff may also be interested in another western American history book, appropriately titled The American West.

Recommended: Yes