Blood and Thunder: An Epic of the American West | 
| Author: Hampton Sides
Publisher: Doubleday
Category: Book
List Price: $26.95
Buy Used: $1.47
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Avg. Customer Rating:  130 reviews
Sales Rank: 64760
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 480
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.9
Dimensions (in): 9.3 x 6.4 x 1.7
ISBN: 0385507771
Dewey Decimal Number: 978.02
EAN: 9780385507776
ASIN: 0385507771
Publication Date: October 3, 2006
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: a good exlibrary copy. Gently used. All pages and cover clear except for a few library markings. Mylar over dustjacket. Binding is canted. No creases.
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Product Description
Praise for Blood and Thunder
“Kit Carson’s role in the conquest of the Navajo during and after the Civil War remains one of the most dramatic and significant episodes in the history of the American West. Hampton Sides portrays Carson in the larger context of the conquest of the entire West, including his frequent and often lethal encounters with hostile Native Americans. Unusually, Sides gives full voice to Indian leaders themselves about their trials and tribulations in their dealings with the whites. Here is a national hero on the level of Daniel Boone, presented with all of his flaws and virtues, in the context of American people’s belief that it was their Manifest Destiny to occupy the entire West.”
—Howard Lamar, Sterling Professor Emeritus of History, Yale University and editor of The New Encyclopedia of the American West
“The story of the American West has seldom been told with such intimacy and immediacy. Legendary figures like Kit Carson leap to life and history moves at a pulse-pounding pace—sweeping the reader along with it. Hampton Sides is a terrific storyteller.”
—Candice Millard, author of The River of Doubt
“Hampton Sides doesn't just write a book, he transports the reader to another time and place. With his keen sense of drama and his crackling writing style, this master storyteller has bequeathed us a majestic history of the Old West.”
—James Bradley, author of Flags of Our Fathers and Flyboys
“Blood and Thunder is a big-hearted book whose subject is as expansive as they come. Hampton Sides tackles it with naked pleasure and narrative cunning: In his telling, the vast saga of America’s westward push has a logical center. The dusty town of Santa Fe becomes the nexus around which swirl the fortunes and strategies of a mixed set of serious overachievers, from Kit Carson, the original mountain man, to James K. Polk, the enigmatic president whose achievements, in the dreaded name of Manifest Destiny, were almost biblical in scope. Sides is alive to the exuberance and alert to the tragedy of the taking of the West.”
—Russell Shorto, author of Island at the Center of the World
“For a huge percentage of us immigrant Americans (those whose ancestors arrived after 1492), Hampton Sides fills a gaping hole in our knowledge of American history—a vivid account of how ‘The New Men’ swept away the thriving civilizations of the Native Americans in their conquest of the West.”
—Tony Hillerman
"BLOOD AND THUNDER is a balanced, thoughtful summary of the American conquistadors in the 19th century Southwest. Hampton Sides has re-created violent events and such inflammatory figures as Kit Carson without bias. Carefully researched, thoroughly enjoyable."
-Evan S. Connell, author of SON OF THE MORNING STAR, CUSTER AND THE LITTLE BIGHORN
A Magnificent History of How the West Was Really Won—a Sweeping Tale of Shame and Glory
In the fall of 1846 the venerable Navajo warrior Narbona, greatest of his people’s chieftains, looked down upon the small town of Santa Fe, the stronghold of the Mexican settlers he had been fighting his whole long life. He had come to see if the rumors were true—if an army of blue-suited soldiers had swept in from the East and utterly defeated his ancestral enemies. As Narbona gazed down on the battlements and cannons of a mighty fort the invaders had built, he realized his foes had been vanquished—but what did the arrival of these “New Men” portend for the Navajo?
Narbona could not have known that “The Army of the West,” in the midst of the longest march in American military history, was merely the vanguard of an inexorable tide fueled by a self-righteous ideology now known as “Manifest Destiny.” For twenty years the Navajo, elusive lords of a huge swath of mountainous desert and pasturelands, would ferociously resist the flood of soldiers and settlers who wished to change their ancient way of life or destroy them.
Hampton Sides’s extraordinary book brings the history of the American conquest of the West to ringing life. It is a tale with many heroes and villains, but as is found in the best history, the same person might be both. At the center of it all stands the remarkable figure of Kit Carson—the legendary trapper, scout, and soldier who embodies all the contradictions and ambiguities of the American experience in the West. Brave and clever, beloved by his contemporaries, Carson was an illiterate mountain man who twice married Indian women and understood and respected the tribes better than any other American alive. Yet he was also a cold-blooded killer who willingly followed orders tantamount to massacre. Carson’s almost unimaginable exploits made him a household name when they were written up in pulp novels known as “blood-and-thunders,” but now that name is a bitter curse for contemporary Navajo, who cannot forget his role in the travails of their ancestors.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 125 more reviews...
 Enjoyable read August 4, 2008
Blood and Thunder is a lively and well-written history about Kit Carson, the exploration of the Southwest, and the eventually pursuit and incarceration of the Navajo after the Civil War.
Sides really knows how to make people and places some alive. The shy and loyal Carson, the preening and vain John C. Fremont, and the proud but somewhat sociopathic Navajo leader Narbona are all brought to life along with dozens of minor characters. Sides makes a point of showing the dark side of manifest destiny and how relentlessly the Indians were pressured to give up their way of life. This book really made me want to go visit New Mexico and Arizona and see the canyons, Anasazi ruins, etc.
Blood and Thunder is an enjoyable read and introduction to the topic.
Reviewer: Liz Clare, co-author of the historical novel "To the Ends of the Earth: The Last Journey of Lewis and Clark"
 Very good history of the American West August 2, 2008
Hampton Sides has written a very solid account of the wild American West. While Kit Carson is the primary focus I would hardly call this a biography - in fact, it appears to be more of a true period history with Kit Carson weaving in and out of the narrative. Oddly, this is my main complaint - parts of Kit Carson's most interesting adventures were only touched upon. I am amazed that Sides did not include more one Carson's travel with Fremont. For an excellent account of these adventures I would highly recommend A Newer World : Kit Carson John C Fremont And The Claiming Of The American West and Pathfinder: John Charles Fremont and the Course of American Empire as excellent companion books.
While I am a bit baffled at the omission of the John Fremont/ Kit Carson adventures it really is my only complaint. Otherwise, Hampton Sides has written a fair and compelling account that speaks to harshness and brutality of the American West. Sides paints a vivid account of the settler/indian skirmishes that plagued the 1800's. Sides shows that both parties had its villains and its peacemakers. Kit Carson is portrayed as 2 parts indian killer and 3 part peacemaker.
"Blood and Thunder" centers on the life of Kit Carson, however the Navajo indians play much more than a secondary role. Sides tells a history of the Navajos that is rarely seen in popular writing. We see that they have flawed characters and utter inability to understand the culture that was thrust on them. The histories of the Navajos and Kit Carson collide when he is forced to embrace a scorched earth policy that drove the Navajos into submission.
Sides has an engaging writing style and while parts get bogged down in detail "Blood and Thunder" typically reads quickly. I also enjoyed the amount of effort that was put into research - while it is true that most of the sources are secondary Sides did an excellent job compiling the facts into a free-flowing narrative.
IF you enjoyed "Blood and Thunder" I would also highly recommend
A Newer World : Kit Carson John C Fremont And The Claiming Of The American West
The Age of Gold: The California Gold Rush and the New American Dream (My personal favorite)
Pathfinder: John Charles Fremont and the Course of American Empire
All three books tell stories that are equally unbelievable and gives you a new respect for the early western pioneers.
Overall 4 1/2 stars rounded to 5
 Secondary source history August 1, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
The author's description of the California Bear revolt, especially his description of the creation of the Bear Republic flag was not the first indication that this author had let his left-wing liberal politics jade his storytelling. And, yes, this is a story book not a history book. During the first 30 pages Sides describes the Navajos as being a tribe that was not murderous but mischeiveous. Yet, by page 100 they've gone on a rampage and slaughtered every man, woman and child. Mr Sides politics seem to flog the same old tired BS: America was and is a evil country ruled by bad men.
BRILLIANT! July 17, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Hampton Sides has written one of the finest histories of the American West to date. BLOOD and THUNDER is a fascinating adventure of not only Kit Carson, but the many people he was associated with in his incredible travels throughout America's western expansion. The characters come alive, as Sides describes their personalities and motivations. This is a very equitable presentation of the conquest of a land and it's people, with rationales for the participants behaviors, both good and bad. Hampton Sides wonderful writing style allows the history told in BLOOD and THUNDER to translate into the present day, and helps to explain current challenges to the land and people of the United States of America.
 A fresh perspective on the expansion of the American West July 16, 2008
12 out of 12 found this review helpful
Subtitled "The Epic Story of Kit Carson and the Conquest of the American West", this 2006 well-documented saga transported me to a time and a place that I've been hearing about all my life. It's all packed into a mere 497 pages and every page unearthed new facts and figures about the history of America from the 1820s to the late 1860s.
The narrative is tied together by following Kit Carson, a frontiersman from the American southwest, a trapper and soldier who was illiterate, but was able to speak five different Indian languages as well as Spanish. I learned a lot from this book, mostly about the people who were involved in what is sometimes called the "manifest destiny" to expand America from ocean to ocean and conquer all peoples who got in their way. Here we meet a cast of familiar characters from President James K. Polk who instigated the Mexican War, to army explorer John Charles Freemont as well as all the army officers and politicians who played a role in changing the landscape of America forever. We also meet the Indians.
The writer brings a critical eye and a deep understanding to the politics of the time which forced the destruction of the various Indian groups. I learned more than I ever thought I would about Indians, especially the Navajos, who fiercely resisted the American expansion but, in the end, became but a shadow of their former selves.
The book is rich in detail, and every page is full of facts. Kit Carson saw himself becoming a legend in his own time. Mostly, this legend was pure fabrication from the pens of flamboyant writers, but his name is forever linked with those turbulent times which saw him eventually becoming an officer for the Union army and leading battles against the Indians who he certainly respected.
The book is interesting and also a little dense for my taste. I found I was forgetting the names of the battles and the officers and the different tribes of Indians as I was reading. It was one of those books that I read all the words but let the details wash over me as I experienced the bigger picture of how the west was won. It was bloody and it wasn't nice. There was cruelty and injustice but that's just the way things were. We can't whitewash the truth of history.
Blood and Thunder gave me a fresh perspective on what really happened all those years ago that formed the America I know and love today. It is not for a book everyone though. I just happen to love history.
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