In 1863, the War Between the States creeps slowly yet inevitably toward its bloody conclusion - and eastern thoughts are already turning to different wars and enemies.
Searching for a life and future, former Kentucky slave Britt Johnson is venturing west into unknown territory with his wife, Mary, and their three children - wary but undeterred by sobering tales of atrocities inflicted upon those who trespass against the Comanche and the Kiowa. Settling on the Texas plains, the Johnson family hopes to build on the dreams that carried them from the Confederate South to this new land of possibility - dreams that are abruptly shattered by a brutal Indian raid upon the settlement while Britt is away establishing a business. Returning to face the unthinkable - his friends and neighbors slain or captured, his eldest son dead, his beloved Mary severely damaged and enslaved, and his remaining children absorbed into an alien society that will never relinquish its hold on them - the heartsick freedman vows not to rest until his family is whole again.
Samuel Hammond follows a different road west. A Quaker whose fortune is destroyed by a capricious act of an inscrutable God, he has resigned himself to the role the Deity has chosen for him. As a new agent for the Office of Indian Affairs, it is Hammond's goal to ferret out corruption and win justice for the noble natives now in his charge. But the proud, stubborn people refuse to cease their raids, free their prisoners, and accept the farming implements and lifestyle the white man would foist upon them, adding fuel to smoldering tensions that threaten to turn a man of peace, faith, and reason onto a course of terrible retribution.
A soaring work of the imagination based on oral histories of the post-Civil War years in North Texas, Paulette Jiles's The Color of Lightning is at once an intimate look into the hearts and hopes of tragically flawed human beings and a courageous reexamination of a dark American history.
Searching for a life and future, former Kentucky slave Britt Johnson is venturing west into unknown territory with his wife, Mary, and their three children - wary but undeterred by sobering tales of atrocities inflicted upon those who trespass against the Comanche and the Kiowa. Settling on the Texas plains, the Johnson family hopes to build on the dreams that carried them from the Confederate South to this new land of possibility - dreams that are abruptly shattered by a brutal Indian raid upon the settlement while Britt is away establishing a business. Returning to face the unthinkable - his friends and neighbors slain or captured, his eldest son dead, his beloved Mary severely damaged and enslaved, and his remaining children absorbed into an alien society that will never relinquish its hold on them - the heartsick freedman vows not to rest until his family is whole again.
Samuel Hammond follows a different road west. A Quaker whose fortune is destroyed by a capricious act of an inscrutable God, he has resigned himself to the role the Deity has chosen for him. As a new agent for the Office of Indian Affairs, it is Hammond's goal to ferret out corruption and win justice for the noble natives now in his charge. But the proud, stubborn people refuse to cease their raids, free their prisoners, and accept the farming implements and lifestyle the white man would foist upon them, adding fuel to smoldering tensions that threaten to turn a man of peace, faith, and reason onto a course of terrible retribution.
A soaring work of the imagination based on oral histories of the post-Civil War years in North Texas, Paulette Jiles's The Color of Lightning is at once an intimate look into the hearts and hopes of tragically flawed human beings and a courageous reexamination of a dark American history.
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Used availability for Paulette Jiles's The Color of Lightning
See all available used copies of this book at: Abebooks UK or Abebooks US
Hardback Editions
April 2009 : Hardback
| Title: The Color of Lightning: A Novel Author(s): Paulette Jiles Publisher: William Morrow Availability: Amazon More details... |
March 2009 : Hardback
| Title: The Color of Lightning: A Novel Author(s): Paulette Jiles ISBN: 0-06-169044-9 / 978-0-06-169044-0 (USA edition) Publisher: William Morrow Availability: Amazon Amazon UK Amazon CA More details... |
Paperback Editions
June 2010 : Paperback
| Title: The Color of Lightning: A Novel (P.S.) Author(s): Paulette Jiles ISBN: 0-06-169045-7 / 978-0-06-169045-7 (USA edition) Publisher: Harper Perennial Availability: Amazon Amazon UK Amazon CA More details... |
April 2010 : Paperback
| Title: Color of Lightning Author(s): Paulette Jiles ISBN: 1-55468-318-1 / 9781554683185 (USA edition) Publisher: HarperCollins Canada / Fiction Availability: Amazon Amazon CA More details... |
April 2009 : Paperback
| Title: The Color of Lightning Author(s): Paulette Jiles ISBN: 0-06-172005-4 / 978-0-06-172005-5 (USA edition) Publisher: Harperluxe Availability: Amazon Amazon UK Amazon CA More details... |
March 2009 : Paperback
| Title: The Color Of Lightning Canadian Author(s): Paulette Jiles ISBN: 1-55468-317-3 / 9781554683178 (USA edition) Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Ltd Availability: Amazon Amazon UK Amazon CA More details... |
Audio Editions
April 2009 : Audio CD
| Title: The Color of Lightning Author(s): Paulette Jiles ISBN: 0-06-171266-3 / 978-0-06-171266-1 (USA edition) Publisher: HarperAudio Availability: Amazon Amazon UK Amazon CA More details... |
Other Editions
March 2009 : Kindle edition
| Title: The Color of Lightning (P.S.) Author(s): Paulette Jiles Publisher: HarperCollins e-books Availability: Amazon Amazon UK More details... |
March 2009 : Unknown
| Title: The Color of Lightning (Unabridged) Author(s): Paulette Jiles Publisher: Harper Audio Availability: Amazon UK More details... |
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