The BookViral Review
Sometimes when you read a novel, it’s so immersive it simply takes over your imagination. Those books are few and far between but that’s exactly what Thunder Falls – The Education of Leopold Red Wolf does. A new Native American Literature release which once again finds Neil Perry Gordon on top form.
Gordon’s narrative is fresh and assured with a sense of intrigue and purpose accompanying Leopold’s adventures at every turn and as with Gordon’s previous releases his feel for detail is terrific.
Every one of his characters is an individual and refreshingly his narrative remains clear of trite clichés as he finds the right pace and style for a story that makes a perceptive and important statement about Native American Indians, the West, the American dream and the lengths to which unprincipled men went to attain it.
We know that Native American Indians were destroyed as an organic community and shunted off to reservations but there’s no stridency or overreaching to be found in Gordon’s narrative and he doesn’t set out to capture the history of a time, but its flavour as he straddles two ideas of civilization: the Indian’s and the white man’s.
Thunder Falls unfolds from the perspective of Gordon’s protagonist Leopold Red Wolf with occasional flashbacks, which are indispensable to the discoveries ahead and as with Gordon’s previous releases, there is hardly an emotion that he doesn’t touch upon.
It’s a story about anger, shame and helplessness and although not explicit in the way you might expect it’s more than enough to elicit a visceral reaction and as an excoriating look at the historical plight of Native American Indians, it bites hard with unexpected plot twists which give Gordon’s novel plenty of solid dramatic impact.
A superb start to a new series from Gordon with particular appeal to readers of his Alaskan Adventures of Percy Hope series, Native American Literature and Westerns, Thunder Falls – The Education of Leopold Red Wolf is unreservedly recommended!