A review by jaxguillette
Empire of the Summer Moon: Quanah Parker and the Rise and Fall of the Comanches, the Most Powerful Indian Tribe in American History by S.C. Gwynne

Did not finish book. Stopped at 17%.

There's a particular Victorian understanding of the world and it's people that places British and American culture at the apex of civilization, and everyone else as somewhere behind them on the path to that "more advanced" level. This is the framing that the author uses throughout the book, that the Comanche subjects were uncivilized and savage, people who didn't "advance" to agriculture. This might be something one could look past in a book from 1910, but not in one from 100 years later. He also portrays American settlers as "steely-eyed" people who "knew in their hearts that the land was there". I don't doubt that he did his research, and that what he says has its basis in fact, but the framing and the interpretation are just so grating at best, and inspire a lack of confidence at worst. I'd rather spend my time with a different book on the same subject. Quite disappointing.