I finally finished Richard Grant's Dispatches from Pluto a well-written study of one of the most unique places in the US, with all its contradictions and lingering racial issues.
The last best book I read in 2016 was Paulette Jiles' News of the World, which made it to many "Best of 2016" book lists. Having a fondness for westerns and Texas history, I found a non-fiction work on the same subject, and it is, so far, a very interesting read.
Scott Zesch, The Captured: A True Story of Abduction by Indians on the Texas Frontier
On New Year's Day in 1870, ten-year-old Adolph Korn was kidnapped by an Apache raiding party. Traded to Comaches, he thrived in the rough, nomadic existence, quickly becoming one of the tribe's fiercest warriors. Forcibly returned to his parents after three years, Korn never adjusted to life in white society. He spent his last years in a cave, all but forgotten by his family.
That is, until Scott Zesch stumbled over his own great-great-great uncle's grave. Determined to understand how such a "good boy" could have become Indianized so completely, Zesch travels across the west, digging through archives, speaking with Comanche elders, and tracking eight other child captives from the region with hauntingly similar experiences. With a historians rigor and a novelists eye, Zesch's The Captured paints a vivid portrait of life on the Texas frontier, offering a rare account of captivity.
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