| During
a lull in a Civil War battle, Corporal Aiden
Kelly reads a
letter from his wife . She writes
that their only child, Jeremiah, has died. She further writes
that she has sold their home and has divorced him and is moving east
with another man. After the war, Corporal Kelly disappears at sea for
several
years. In
March of 1872 he journeys northwest by riverboat on the Arkansas River
en route
to
a Kansas cow town where he hopes to create a new life. At Little Rock a
young preacher boards the steam paddlewheeler. Aiden is convinced the
young
man is his son. Each is bound for the newborn Great Plains
settlement,
Grande Savanne. This is a story of reconciliation, passage to manhood, and redemptive love set against the historical backdrop of the 1872 Kansas plains. It is a unique moment in American history. Powerful forces converge on the crucible of fictional Grande Savanne: Texas cowboys and longhorn beeves, buffalo hunters and the last of the great migratory bison herds; homesteaders from the Eastern United States and Europe; outlaws, misfits, Civil War refugees, U.S. Cavalry; wild and still deadly Cheyenne; the Santa Fe Railroad; and inexorable Manifest Destiny. |
