And Then I Read: FLAMING ARROWS

© heirs of William O. Steele. Cover illustration by James Bernardin.

This is the last of the recent reprints by Steele that I picked up a few years ago. I began reading his books about frontier life in my youth, then they were out of print for a long time. Now at least four of them have been reprinted  by Odyssey/Harcourt.

Chad Rabun and his family live in an area of what is now Tennessee that is just being settled by white farmers, on land claimed by the Chickamauga Indians, and are in constant danger from their raiding parties. When word comes that a raid is planned, Chad and his family retreat with their neighbors to the nearest fort, which is small and not well supplied, without even a water source inside its stockade walls. Soon a siege is underway, with the Indians keeping the settlers from the nearby spring, and in constant fear of their attack. In addition to their other worries, the settlers are unhappy that the Logan boys and their mother have joined the settlers, since their father has turned traitor and joined the Indians, fighting against them. Only Chad and his father are willing to stand up for the Logan boys, everyone else is ready to turn them out of the fort to face the warlike raiders. This makes a stressful situation even harder for Chad. Then a new threat is revealed when the Indians begin trying to burn them out of the fort with flaming arrows and other tricks. Will they be able to hang on until reinforcements arrive?

Steele wastes no words in his action-filled stories, and this is another great read, touching base with history, and yet giving thoughtful insight into human nature on both sides of the tense struggle. Recommended.