Summer of Pearls - by Mike Blakely (Paperback)

About the Book

Ben Cromwell remembers the Great Caddo Pearl Rush of 1874. He was 14, and in love with an enchanting woman. His hometown of Port Caddo was dying, and by summer's end, the Pearl Boom had ended. Port Caddo was doomed, and the mystery of who killed Judd Kelso had begun. It took Ben 40 years to solve the mystery, and once he did, the proof came to him as the only witness.

Book Synopsis

Ben Crowell remembers the Great Caddo Lake Pearl Rush of 1874 well. Ben would fall in love for the first time that summer during one of the last great rushes of the nineteenth century, a rush that could not have come at a better time for the riverboat community of Port Caddo.

Just a few months earlier the town had been dying. The railroads that were cutting across the country made the riverboat meaningless, and those same railroads didn't stop anywhere near Port Caddo. By the end of the summer, the pearl rush was over, and the mystery about who killed Judd Kelso, a local riverboat owner, had begun.

It took Ben forty years to solve the mystery, and when he did, the proof came for him alone to witness. He is the only living soul who knows what happened that September night in 1874.

Review Quotes

"Reads briskly and is leavened with much Comanche lore." --Publishers Weekly on Comanche Dawn

"Painstakingly researched and carefully written, the novel is an obvious labor of love that merits comparison with such established classics as Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, Little Big Man, and Hanta Yo." --Booklist on Comanche Dawn

"A well-made novel can sometimes inform a reader far better than documents of history. Comanche Dawn is such a novel." --Dee Brown, author of Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee on Comanche Dawn

"Mike Blakely writes with authority and empathy about a people superbly suited to the land they roamed." --Lucia St. Clair Robson, author of Ride the Wind on Comanche Dawn

"Mike Blakely turns the horses loose in all our souls." --W. Michael Gear and Kathleen O'Neal Gear on Comanche Dawn

About the Author

MIKE BLAKELY is the author of several novels of the American West, including Too Long at the Dance and Comanche Dawn. His newspaper column, "Lone Star Legacy," has appeared in more than thirty newspapers. He lives in Marble Falls, Texas.