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David777
Posted September 13, 2009
I know the author and often prodded him to publish his fiction. Now he has, and we readers are the beneficiaries. Ken Byerly writes in a style that reminds me of Hemingway but with a voice uniquely his own.
Let's look at the book. GHOST DANCE is the story of an aging newspaper reporter who tries to come to terms with his past. Ken writes, "Like most reporters over thirty, Kyle Hansen had little faith in human nature." Yet he gives us a man who on the darkest of nights can glimpse ahead the lights of Twodot or the Fort Belknap Indian Reservation and drive on with anticipation.
There are scenes here that resonate with me strongly. Walk with Kyle Hansen bare ridges where history tells sad stories. Climb with him sacred Bear Butte in South Dakota where he attempts, as the sun sinks below the Black Hills, to dance the legendary ghost dance and call his dead brother back to life.
Montana's a big state and these are big characters. There's tall, arrogant Ginny Foster, football coach Harley Hawkins and Kyle's former college football teammate Salmon Thirdkill. Sports, Salmon says, can break your heart. So can war. So can kids playing football in an open field.
I like this book and I'll read it again and again and feel something new.
Overview