News of the World
by Paulette Jiles
In this day of receiving world news the instant it happens,
often as it is happening, it’s hard
to imagine how and when news was received in small isolated towns in the post-Civil
War days.
Author Paulette Jiles takes us to a time and place in our
country’s history, 1870, as we meet Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd who earns his
living reading the world’s news to rapt audiences in the territories of north
Texas. The novel is about a precious
long-gone time when the news was a rare commodity and an expert reader like
Captain Kidd could both inform and entertain his eager crowds.
The captain is an honorable man and veteran of two wars who
printing business has gone bust, whose wife has died and whose daughters are
grown and married. After a Wichita Falls reading, an acquaintance offers a
$50.00 reward for the return of a 10-year old white girl who was captured by
the Kiowa to her only relatives some 400 miles away, near San Antonio. Despite
grave reservations, Kidd agrees to make the journey, not so much for the reward
but because it seems the honorable thing to do.
The girl, Johanna, is sullen, prone to running away and
remembers nothing before her time with the Kiowa tribe. She mourns her Kiowa mother, her family, her
nomadic life. The Captain, while at times exasperated by his charge, is a
tender-hearted man who does his best to protect her and ease her painful
transition back into the “civilized” world.
Johanna is a hellion from the start. To prepare for their
journey, a group of Wichita Falls whores try to bathe and dress her. At the end
of the bath, the tub is on its side and dripping water onto the red-flocked
wallpaper in their receiving parlor. So
begins the journey for the Captain and Johanna, pure adventure in the wilds of
an untamed Texas and the reconciling of vastly different cultures, as Kidd has
to explain to her when she is all set to collect a white man’s scalp, that
“this is considered very impolite” and simply isn’t done. Johanna doesn’t speak
English, eats with her hands and knows how to use a revolver. Her skills serve
them well as they encounter violent weather, bandits and Comanche raids. At a crucial moment, she proves to be a
fearless warrior.
As well as the adventure of their journey, there is
persistent suspense throughout as to what will happen to Johanna when she and
Kidd reach their destination. It goes without saying that the young girl and
the older man develop a close bond and become trusting friends.
If you are a fan of the movies True Grit (a girl on a long journey with an older man) and The Searchers (a man’s journey to rescue
a white girl who has been captured by Indians), you will probably enjoy News of the World. Author Jiles, herself a rancher near San Antonio,
has been praised for her ability to build absorbing dramatic scenes as well as
giving her readers authentic descriptions. One reviewer says, “Food, smells,
characters encountered along the road, the uneasy towns….all have the feel of
truth, of a time and place brought vividly to life.”
For me, as well as the absorbing adventure, the beauty of
this book was that it gave evidence of the best and worst in human nature with
the good prevailing. As I write this review, there is a steady stream of rain
falling in Munds Park. This is the
perfect book to be your rainy-day companion.
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