4 comments about Confessions of an Igloo Dweller: Memories of the Old Arctic.

1. This book was a delight to read. Mr. Houston's admiration for the Inuit culture is evident on every page. Many of the passages and stories are thought provoking and educational. I especially enjoyed his descriptions of bewilderment turned to enlightenment by such unassuming teachers.



2. Really enjoyable. This man's interraelationship with a disappearing culture and the hurdles he faced in the Arctic wilderness are tangible and detailed. Mostly this book is about a youth (his own) - lost but still remembered. I read Joseph Conrad's Youth at the same time and the themes were quite similar.



3. First this is a book about art. If you have ever wondered how those most beautiful Eskimo sculptures and prints have found their way to your local gallery; this book tells you how.

   Mr. Houston was the first artist to recognize and search out the Inuit artforms and to deliver them to the art markets "outside". In every detail, name by name, you can read about the Inuit art culture from the very first stone figures and bone scluptures, to the latest prints.

   Second this is a book about Arctic. Adventure on a epic scale. Mr. Houstons' honeymoon was one of the very few trips from east to west across Baffin Island by sled. Mr and Mrs. Houston spent years in the Arctic living in the Inuit way; both their sons spoke Inuktitut in preference to English and preferred raw seal meat to... well that was all there was to eat.

   Sadly there are in this book no prints of the Inuit art, nor photos of the artists, nor any example of the art described in the text. For all the journeys by sled, boat, plane, and on foot there are no suitable maps. For a book about a culture that is so completely linked to geography, there are no maps for the reader to follow nor plates for the art lover to love.

   The most astonsihing event of the book occurs on page 9. A very young Mr. Houston steps off of a plane in the Hudson's Bay Arctic, looks around, and flatly refuses to live any place else; He stays for 15 years.

   You can add Mr. Houston to the list with Barry Lopez, William Vollmann , Farley Mowat, and John McPhee; thoes writers that get the Arctic Expericence




4. This is one of the finest first-person, historical narratives I've read for many years. Mr. Houston provides a unique, non-judgemental series of observations and first-hand stories about the Inuit and his own experiences living among them and working with them and, most importantly, learning from them. He is very honest in relating his own foibles and potentially life-threatening mistakes. His style is very easy to read and personal and I could not put this book down after starting it. Mr. Houston lived a highly privileged and unique life among a pre-literate but very evolved group during a crucial turning point for their culture. This is a rare and wonderful narrative.

No comments about On Native Ground: Memoirs and Impressions (American Indian Literature and Critical Studies Series).

5 comments about The Last Comanche Chief: The Life and Times of Quanah Parker.

1. Good, well put together book about Quanah Parker.
   If you like native American history, this is one book you should defiantly have for your personal library.



2. I received the book in a timely manner and it is everything I hoped it would be.



3. This is a very good book if you are interested in the life of Quanah Parker. . . Very Good
   
   Thank You,
   Lehman Tiller



4. Written okay, but I mean REALLY! Why not saint the individual who is the subject of this book? Perhaps he could walk on water to among all of his other superhuman qualities???? If you take the time to read the reviews here - all by people who are wannabe Indians and/or haters of their own heritage and race - you'll get a very distorted view of what this book contains - which is a record of brutality, sadistic butchery, and mindless aggression against other peoples, until of course, elements such as the Texas Rangers took the starch out and fight out of said noble Red Aristocrat.
   But there is an even more important point that needs to be addressed. This point concerns how ANY modern-day writer can possibly write about a long-dead individual of a completely alien culture in an accurate way. That is, its one thing to write about what this particular Indian ( or any other individual Indian of any other tribe ) did during his life according to what is known of his ACTIVITIES, but it is utterly impossible to write about his FEELINGS, his DESIRES, his MOTIVATIONS, his THOUGHTS, etc. Since the writer cannot "get inside the mind" of this Indian, how can he possibly offer the reader anything except story, not fact concerning this Indian's character and personality? This author, and many like him, simply weave their own biases and tastes into a personality profile of one Indian or another, and then offer this trash to the reader as FACT, when in fact it is mere story telling.
   If you happen to be interested in the Comanche, read "Comanches - Pimlico Wild West Series", and get FACTS, not modern-day fiction-as-fact. For example; take note that the Comanches slaughtered other Indian tribes without mercy ( almost exterminating many groups of the Apeches ) and ran a bustling slave trade in which they sold captives among themselves or to the Spanish. They also acted as mercinaries, accepting money from the Spanish to exterminate Apaches in the northern Provinces of Mexico ( in one year, the Comanches were paid 18,000.00 Pesos for Apache scalps - 6 Pesos per scalp! ).
   And except for the Kiowa, who often had their bloody, horrific, sadistic outrages mistaken for depredations of Comanches, the Comanches were easily the most brutal and fiendish of all the Plains Tribes when it came to abuse, torture, and inhuman treatment of captives ( Red, White, or Mexican ). No, there is a LOT the reader should be aware of in books dealing with Indians such as these, but such FACTS are carefully kept out of the reader's awareness by books like this one. Read on through this review of mine and learn!
   
   This sort of quasi-sob story type of literature (proliferating these days) which deals with long-dead Amer-Indians and events of the past really are annoying. Much better books are Three Years Among the Comanches: The Narrative of Nelson Lee, the Texas Ranger and Nine Years Among the Indians, 1870-1879: The Story of the Captivity and Life of a Texan Among the Indians as well as Scalp Dance: Indian Warfare on the High Plains, 1865-1879 and lastly, Life Among the Apaches (Bison Book). And be sure not to miss The Kiowas (Civilization of the American Indian Series). Each of these books which I recommend is superb in its own way and for specific reasons, and all will serve to blast the reader straight out of the present Politically Correct SPELL of Fiction-As-Fact concerning the American Indians of the Western Frontier - a spell which has been cast by the likes of Dee Brown with his psuedo history-fantasy "Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee" and movies like K. Costner's imbecilic "Dances With Wolves" ( or more appropriately, "DUNCES With Wolves").
   
   Thanks to crack-brained leftist snivelers making one highly slanted documentary after another, and of course the hack writers who seek to twist historic record and fact so it conforms to their own civilization-depreciating schemes, we are swamped with PC Sob Story works like this one that leave the unknowledgeable reader with a completely FALSE impression about what actually happened under the vast and lonely skies of the center of this continent only a few hundred years ago.
   
   Consider this problem seriously. You are being fed half-truths, distorted information, and twisted facts in many cases by books such as this one. Now, if you're interested in an ACCURATE perspective on the Wild Frontier, read the titles I've recommended for you here, especially "Comanches - Pimlico Wild West". If you're one of these well-programmed PC flunkies who thinks he or she "has it all figured out" when it comes to the poor, helpless, hounded AmerIndians of yesteryear, then you absolutely must read the titles I've recommended here! I DARE YOU! Do this and THEN read this book and other trumped-up trash literature such as "Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee" and watch "Dunces With Wolves" and you'll see just how the wool's been pulled over your eyes!



5. Bill Neeley gives new life to the legend of Quanah Parker, Numu Paraiboo. More than just a biography, this book gives valuable insights into the culture and lifestyle of the Numunuu people and the training of the "Lords of the Plains", the best mounted cavalry in the world. Highly recommend for its accuracy and truth. Five stars

1 comments about Son of Two Bloods (North American Indian Prose Award).

1. Says the University of Nebraska Press:

   When Vince Mendoza began to write his life story, he turned to his memory of visiting the deathbed of his great-grandmother, a Creek Indian who embodied the history and dauntless will of her people. The memory inspired both sorrow and boundless pride.

   Son of Two Bloods, Mendoza's vibrant and candid account of his life, is full of such grief and rejoicing. Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 1947, Mendoza was the child of a Creek mother and a Mexican father. In this book he vividly portrays his Mexican and Indian relatives and his confusing, often painful, childhood interactions with the dominant white society. He left childhood behind when he was sent to Vietnam. There he found hatred, terror, and camraderie in equal measures.

   On returning from Vietnam Mendoza faced a professional, economic, and personal struggles but found consolidation in love, family, and friendship. His moving account of his first wife's courageous, losing battle with cancer ends with renewal as Mendoza remarries and decides to explore his past, and his people, in writing. "Endure, then weep," he writes at last, "endure, and be rewarded, endure and rejoice, endure and learn."

   Son of Two Bloods is his first book

1 comments about Yellowsnake: Son of Prophecy.

1. This book is so filled with adventure and intrigue that you just can't put it down. Jake Conrad is superb in his weaving the life of this remarkable character, Yellowsnake, from his life on a reservation to the jungles of Vietnam. Yellowsnake was taught well in the ways of his great Commanche herritage and went on to be a super Warrior for the battles of Vietnam, His physical strength and abilities, keen mind and his will to get the job done with whatever it takes, make him a true super hero. He finds a place in the mighty Suprstitions Mtns. of Arizona to rest his body and soul and to wait for yet another call from the C.I.A. Yellowsnake was truly one of the best tools the U.S. had.

   This book would make a super movie, think of the many sequels! I would hope Conrad will give us more of this wonderfuly exciting character.

No comments about Kids Lunches (A Picture and text reference).

No comments about Indian Lives: Essays on Nineteenth- And Twentieth-Century Native American Leaders.

No comments about Mary Wells (Alive in Four Fascinating Books).

No comments about Massasoit of the Wampanoags.

5 comments about Give Me My Father's Body: The Life of Minik, the New York Eskimo.

1. Poor Minik, captured by white traders and brought to Manhattan to be a freak! It was the age of freaks, when everyone who was different was first taken away from their home, and then put on display. Minik found out that his beloved father had been stuffed and mounted for all to jeer at the New York Museum of Natural History.
   
   Author Harper has been through the files of the Museum and what he has come up with will convince even people who love the Museum, that reparations are in order. Eskimo people are not the only ones outraged at the long ago disposition of native relics. It is still worthy of outrage. What puzzles me is actor Kevin Spacey's interest in this affair. His preface to the book is well-written, not that I believe he actually put pen to paper to write it up, but clearly he has an emotional investment in this material and, from what I understand, he is planning to play Minik himself once his duties as Lex Luthor are finished in the new Superman movie. But why not let a native actor play the part? My in-laws who know Kenn Harper by reputation, and who have seen him speak in public, say that Spacey is part Inuit and hgas had a long interest in Peary's expeditions.
   
   Peary himself emerges from Harper's well-researched book as a bit of a mixed bag. On the one hand he showed true courage in surmounting obstacles and sub zero temperatures. On the other hand he was not particular gifted in solving human personnel difficulties, and seems to have grown impatient if his will was crossed by others (or by the hand of God). We have all known men like Peary--impetuous, self-assured, and gifted. But few of us have known the crushing tragedy of Minik of Qaanaaq, of Greenland's icy shores.



2. This book is a must-read. The reader must come into it ready to make his or her own conclusions about the material, though, as it is written to persuade a certain viewpoint. With no other viewpoints offered to compare this one to, it is difficult to say for certain if this one is correct. The story is one that anyone interested in humanity, globalization, anthropology or just an interesting story should read.



3. Kenn Harper's Give Me My Father's Body is undeniably and superbly researched; easily the book's crowning achievement. Occasionally though, I was annoyed with the "what if" scenarios. At least twice in the book Harper says what would have happened if things had gone another way. In one instance, the book describes Minik's plan to return to the Greenland and to lead a group of Inuit to the North Pole. He hoped to attain international honour for his people. Harper made the declaration that even had Minik tried, there was no way that he would have been successful. He further added that Minik's desire to prove the superiority of his race was an ethnocentric idea no doubt learned from the white people of New York, that the Greenland Inuit would balk at such ideas and that, with nothing to gain but glory for their people, they would surely refuse to help Minik. Even if Harper's learned ethnocentrism theory is correct, Harper has no way of ever knowing what Minik could have accomplished had he tried. If Minik had learned such ideas from white people, who's to say the Greenland Inuit wouldn't in turn learn such ideas from Minik? The point is, no one knows what would have happened and it is futile to guess (even for the well-informed). Also, the edition of the book that I have, has included discussion questions at the end for readers groups. These are very laughable. To paraphrase a typical question, "Kenn Harper lives among the people that he writes about and is therefore the greatest historian and writer to ever write about Northern peoples. Discuss how his portrayal of Eskimos is the most accurate description ever to be put on paper." But despite the embarrassing readers club guide at the end and the occasional subjective statement from Harper, the book is eye-opening about the victims of science and was a pleasurable read.



4. Kenn Harper has managed to bring together an amazing story through detailed research. Minik, the Polar Eskimo child, was brought to the US by Robert Peary and essentially placed on display. The story of his disconnected life is full of pathos and sorrow. Yet Harper weaves the story with life.

   Peary's behaviors were simply egotistic and reprehensible. He treated the Eskimos as his property. He placed their lives in harms' way by bringing them to a culture and location that assaulted their senses and immune systems. Minik was the price paid for that deed.

   I did get bogged down in names from time to time, especially as Harper recounted the financial misdealings of Wallace, who had taken responsibility for Minik. But overall, the story is entertaining and enlightening. It speaks to the ethnocentrism of Peary's generation and to the isolation of the Polar Eskimos. It took me a long time to read and absorb this book but it was rewarding in the end... to see and feel a culture so far away.




5. Storyline is very intriguing, but the writing is a bit droll. It is also longer than necessary.