Johnny D. Boggs turns the battlefield itself into a character in this historical retelling of Custer’s Last Stand, when George Custer led most of his command to annihilation at the Battle of the Little Bighorn in southern Montana in 1876.
More than forty first-person narratives are used—Indian and white, military and civilian, men and women—to paint a panorama of the battle itself.
Boggs brings the events and personalities of the Battle of the Little Bighorn to life in a series of first-hand accounts.
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“Most of us are familiar with the Battle of the Little Big Horn…Do we need another retelling? Listeners to Boggs’ version will give a resounding yes. A group of nine narrators inhabits the forty-seven characters, and their memorable performances immerse listeners in compelling first-person accounts from both the army’s and Native Americans’ points of view…The evenhanded examination of what went right and wrong on both sides and the haunting voices that tell their own tales make this engrossing western-set novel an example of historical fiction at its best.”
— Booklist (starred audio review)
“Boggs gives voice to all classes of soldier and Sioux, to the desperation of Custer’s command, and the determination of their foe.”
— Historical Novels Review“Boggs writes from the heart, almost as if he is channeling each person.”
— News-Gazette (Champaign, Illinois)“Boggs adds yet another perspective to this famous Old West fight…[and] he carries it off beautifully…The highlight is Boggs’ portrayals of Captain Frederick Benteen and Major Marcus Reno and their surviving cavalrymen…This novel contains no new historical scholarship, but it does effectively paint a grim, gory, and realistic image of Indian warfare, period racism, and the political scapegoating that usually occurs after a military disaster.”
— Publishers Weekly“Approaches [the Battle of the Little Bighorn] as a mosaic, using some forty-seven points of view, from the famous, such as Crazy Horse and Custer’s wife, Libbie, to such minor characters as an army trumpeter and a brash Indian teen trying to count coup…An almost unbearably intense narrative…this is an enthralling book.”
— Booklist (starred review)Be the first to write a review about this audiobook!
Johnny D. Boggs has worked cattle, been bucked off horses (breaking two ribs last time), shot rapids in a canoe, hiked across mountains and deserts, traipsed around ghost towns, and spent hours poring over microfilm in library archives—all in the name of finding a good story. He has won nine Spur Awards, making him the all-time leader in Western Writers of America’s history. He also writes for numerous magazines, including True West, Wild West, Boys’ Life, and Western Art & Architecture, speaks and lectures often, studies old Western and film noir movies, and is former newspaper journalist.
Traber Burns worked for thirty-five years in regional theater, including the New York, Oregon, and Alabama Shakespeare festivals. He also spent five years in Los Angeles appearing in many television productions and commercials, including Lost, Close to Home, Without a Trace, Boston Legal, Grey’s Anatomy, Cold Case, Gilmore Girls, and others.
Tanya Eby is a novelist and an audiobook narrator who has earned several AudioFile Earphones Awards and been nominated for the Audie Award. She has a BA degree in English language and literature and an MFA in creative writing from the University of Southern Maine.
Michael Kramer is an AudioFile Earphones Award winner, a finalist for the prestigious Audie Award for Best Narration, and recipient of a Publishers Weekly Listen-Up Award. He is also an actor and director in the Washington, DC, area, where he is active in the area’s theater scene and has appeared in productions at the Shakespeare Theatre, the Kennedy Center, and Theater J.
Johnny Heller, winner of numerous Earphones and Audie Awards, was named a “Golden Voice” by AudioFile magazine in 2019. He has been a Publishers Weekly Listen-Up Award winner from 2008 through 2013 and he has been named a top voice of 2008 and 2009 and selected as one of the Top 50 Narrators of the Twentieth Century by AudioFile magazine.
Donald Corren is an audiobook narrator and a New York actor with leading credits on and Off-Broadway, as well as numerous television appearances. On Broadway, he costarred with Judy Kaye in the critically acclaimed production of Souvenir, and replaced Harvey Fierstein in the seminal production of Torch Song Trilogy. His Off-Broadway appearances include The Soap Myth, Dietrich & Chevalier, The Last Sunday in June, Stephen Sondheim’s Saturday Night, and the original New York production of Tomfoolery. His television credits include eight seasons as forensic tech Medill on NBC’s Law & Order, as well as his current role as Dr. Kurian on Syfy’s Z Nation.
Eric G. Dove is a multiple Earphones Award–winning narrator, and his credits include more than one hundred audiobooks. He is also an accomplished musician and a budding author, who published Ghosts of Royston in 2013. He is a graduate of Ohio State University.
Jim Meskimen is a stage, film, and television actor who has appeared in many well-known movies and television shows. He acted in Apollo 13 and Frost/Nixon for director Ron Howard, both of which were nominated for Best Picture Oscars. His television appearances include The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, Friends, Lie to Me, Criminal Minds, and Parks and Recreation. He is also a painter, award-winning audiobook narrator, and audiobook director for Galaxy Audio.
Patrick Lawlor, an award-winning narrator, is also an accomplished stage actor, director, and combat choreographer. He has worked extensively off Broadway and has been an actor and stuntman in both film and television. He has been an Audie Award finalist multiple times and has garnered several AudioFile Earphones Awards, a Publishers Weekly Listen-Up Award, and many starred audio reviews from Library Journal and Kirkus Reviews.
Lloyd James (a.k.a. Sean Pratt) has been a working professional actor in theater, film, television, and voice-overs for more than thirty years. He has narrated over one thousand audiobooks and won numerous Earphones Awards and nominations for the Audie Award and the Voice Arts Award. He holds a BFA degree in acting from Santa Fe University, New Mexico.
Keith Szarabajka has appeared in many films, including The Dark Knight, Missing, and A Perfect World, and on such television shows as The Equalizer, Angel, Cold Case, Golden Years, and Profit. Szarabajka has also appeared in several episodes of Selected Shorts for National Public Radio. He won the 2001 Audie Award for Unabridged Fiction for his reading of Tom Robbins’s Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates and has won several Earphones Awards.
Blair Underwood is an author and award-winning actor, director, and producer. He lives in Los Angeles, California.