Thank you NetGalley for the eARC. I was not sure what to expect out of this book and I just thought the guy on it was hot actually but I was pleasantly surprised . This book was so good. I was having problems with my own son at the time and this book helped. The story was gripping, the subject was interesting. I love history so there was that in there as well. Over all i could not put this book down.

Of course I question the white man’s written history. He has lied and rewritten the facts in ways to no end just to suit his selfish means. But that doesn’t mean I am going to buy into a new history, or even consider what might have been, or happened, or did not. Crazy Horse is an iconic figure to many, including myself. A few years ago the writer Dan O’Brien published his fine book The Contract Surgeon which I consider to be the very best historical fiction regarding the connected lives of both Crazy Horse and the famed Indian Agent Valentine T. McGillycuddy. Much of what I read in Daniel Lee’s book is in step with O’Brien’s, except for the made-up stuff that appears to be real or lifted from the actual journals of Valentine T. McGillycuddy. But who knows? Creative license has been applied which causes me worry and doubt that the book is tainted. The evidence presented seems rational enough, and the historical writing is quite different from the parallel story of bonding between father and son. But I am not completely bought out by it all.

"...it is not good that the whites do not obey the Christ’s teachings. If they did, they would not treat the Indians bad…"

One thing this book does is constantly bring to light the injustices done to our Native Americans throughout our history even up to our current day. So much racial hatred, inequality, and thoughtlessness to swirl around the bowl twice and then some. Another aspect the book touches on is Lee’s son’s recovery from addiction, bad decisions, wrong forks in the road, and the determination it takes to overcome these obstacles some of us are faced with in this life. In some ways the book is about redemption and in others the untold lies and cruelties inflicted on our people whose only crime was their wish to be free. At times these two parallel stories fail to click on all cylinders.

"...Believing Crazy Horse was unfairly arrested and destined to a prison in Florida, what if McGillycuddy, a man willing to lie if he believed the ends justified, chose to falsify Crazy Horse’s death?"

The idea is not far-fetched, but surely there would be some forensic fact to come home to roost about the death and/or resurrection of Crazy Horse as the leader of the Ghost Dance. Historical fiction should have some basis in truth, and if not, then full disclosure of whatever is false and subsequently, in turns, unbelievable. Not the best writing here, and not even the greatest of stories regarding father and son, but my heart goes out to both men as they continue on in their heartfelt life journeys.