Forge of Fury

by Jack Hoffenberg

Now, in an exciting new kind of Hoffenberg story, he takes on the wilderness and shows how it was tamed by people of towering strength, courage, and all-too-human weakness.Here is the story of Kane Boyden, a man who seized land where he found it and power where it offered itself. But Kane Boyden was a searcher, and he hadn't yet found what he was looking for...

302 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1967

About the author

Jack Hoffenberg (1906-1977) was an advertising executive in Washington, D.C., and Baltimore, Maryland, who became a novelist after relocating to California in the 1950s.

Reviews

[Eleanor Thompson · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF; abandoned page 149, halfway through. The first half of the story is about a former Union army major who is sent to a fort in Arizona a few years after the American Civl War. He is to attempt to broker a deal concerning the local native American tribes with the intent of quelling more frequently and bolder attacks on the colonists. Major Boyden heads into the village full of former confederates, a principle one being Khilrain, who basically owns and runs the place. He joins a poker game in the back of a bar the first night he arrives and has the funds to buy $50 worth of chips. Hold the phone, what? That's the equivalent of approximately $1500 in today's currency. Then he's offered a job in a coal mine. So that might net him $2/day in miserable working conditions for 2-2.5 times what he just casually bought chips with. The raises go at $5 bet ($150) and the drinks are a whopping $1.15 each when they should be going for$0.25-.50. This poor research led me to believe that much of the rest of the story also suffered the same fate. Ugh. Lazy authors make me cranky. Also, I found it strange that these movers and shakers in town opened up about all kinds of interesting topics with a total stranger, Boyden. One of the points of discussion centered on a serious incident that Boyden knew about but shouldn't have, seeing as he claimed to have just arrived; and yet he did not ask for more details of the incident (it is definitely against human nature not to express curiousity). Better books await.

[J. Ewbank · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book by Hoffenberg was an interesting read. It did not follow the lead in on the back of the book, but that is probably for the next book in the series. This is an interesting book about Arizona and the early years of wars and accommodations with the Indians and with others who were not always happy with the government of Arizona or who thought they could get along without it. I enjoyed it.

J. Robert Ewbank author "John Wesley, Natural Man, and the Isms" "Wesley's Wars" "To Whom It May Concern" and "Tell Me About the United Methodist Church"