Adventurous Deed of Deadwood Jones, The

ALAN Review, Winter 2009 by Schmutz, Mary

The Adventurous Deed of Deadwood Jones by Helen Hemphill Front Street, 2008, 228 pp., $16.95 Cowboys/ African Americans ISBN 978-1-59078-637-6

Prometheus Jones has won a fine horse fair and square in a town raffle. It's too bad no one is happy for him except his cousin, Omer Shine. After all, just because blacks are free in these post-Civil War times doesn't mean blacks should have things those whites, like the Dills, have.

These are just some of the troubles young Prometheus and Omer face as they traverse away from the Dills and onto a cattle drive to the Dakota area. They battle new biases from whites, Hispanics, and even the Indians. Along the way, Prometheus learns how to fend for himself and how to battle for the truth, whatever that truth may be.

Even though this book is set in the post Civil War era, this has so much to offer young people of all backgrounds. Hemphill takes a tall tale and makes it applicable in today's society.

Mary Schmutz

Junction City, KS