War Chief by Edgar Rice Burroughs

As previously mentioned, I was quite taken with my first Edgar Rice Burroughs Western, Bandit of Hell's Bend. So taken that I decided that I needed another ERB Western right away. And fortunately I had some of that at hand. I'd purchased the The Edgar Rice Burroughs Western MEGAPACK from Amazon (for a mere 99¢ . . . and when I went to fact check this bit I saw that it is now selling for a merer 55¢) which included The Bandit of Hell's Bend, The War Chief, Apache Devil, and The Deputy Sheriff of Comanche County, so I was all full up there. But I also had two copies of The War Chief in solid form--one a lovely (though a bit worn) first edition hardback

and the other a very nice Ballantine paperback

I decided to go for the hardback version, though I occasionally open up the paperback just to check on things.

That hardback, though . . . .  91 years old. I can't help but wonder how many other people have held this book, thrilled to the adventures of Ish-kay-nay / Shaz-Dijiji. It boggles my mind. 

I am not very far into the book at this point . . . maybe 60 pages of 

380+ . . . but it only took a page or two for it to hit me that this was radically different from The Bandit of Hell's Bend. In fact, everything that I loved about Bandit is missing here: the humor, the romance, the snappy adventure stuff. Which is not to say that I am not enjoying The War Chief. Quite the contrary. This book is more like a historical novel than a Western adventure, though, and it is pretty much deadly serious. Burroughs does several things here which are a bit astonishing considering the date of its initial publication: he uses quite a few Native American terms in his story, and he is writing from an American Indian point of view. Which is not to say that he is sanctifying the AIs . . . not at all. Amongst them are some seriously cruel people. But it is also very clear that he sees the Whites as the invaders who stole the land from the Native Americans, constantly betrayed them, and ruthlessly tried to exterminate them. 

This seriously reads like it was written by Dee Brown. And I don't think I can give a higher compliment than that.

ANYway . . . have to get back to The War Chief now. Just thought you should know. 

[Cue the Colombo voice]: Just one more thing. I am asTONished that no one has to date made a movie based on this book. It would be so fucking awesome. The scene with the young ones hunting the jackrabbit alone would be worth the price of admission. So if there are any rich folks out there reading . . . think about it. Okay? Okay.