{"product_id":"the-big-lonesome","title":"The Big Lonesome","description":"\u003cb\u003eFrom the \u003ci\u003eNew York Times \u003c\/i\u003ebestselling author of \u003ci\u003eA Fever in the Heartland\u003c\/i\u003e, a thrilling real-life Western that is also a powerful reckoning with the drama and heroism at the final moments of the American frontier.\u003c\/b\u003e \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eA story of a hard land and a most remarkable man trying to find a home under the open skies of the American Southwest, \u003ci\u003eThe Big Lonesome\u003c\/i\u003e is the true tale of a frontier like no other. In the final days of the wars against the last free Native tribes, the U.S. government dispatched a corps of fierce fighters comprised of formerly enslaved men--the legendary Buffalo Soldiers. They could out-ride and out-endure nearly every other cavalry unit. And yet, they were largely despised by the people they were trying to protect. At their helm was a brilliant twenty-one-year-old, Lieutenant Henry Ossian Flipper, the first Black West Point graduate, the first Black officer to serve in the Regular U.S. Army, and now the only Black officer to command a company of soldiers. He was a scholar, a seeker, and a soldier, loyal to a country that rarely loved him back. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eBorn into slavery, Henry Flipper endured staggering racial prejudice as a young cadet and officer before setting out on a quest that would shape the West to this day. \u003ci\u003eThe Big Lonesome\u003c\/i\u003e is the story of his life at the crossroads of legendary characters--Quanah Parker, the leader of the Comanche, with whom Flipper hunted buffalo; Victorio, the Apache chief, and Geronimo, his fellow warrior during the twilight of the Indian Wars; and a young Irish-American woman, Mollie Dwyer, whose affection for him ultimately led to his downfall. Together, they speak of a nation struggling with life-or-death contradictions at the end of Reconstruction and the dawn of the Gilded Age. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eWith his signature page-turning prose and breathtaking depth of research, Egan crafts a clear-eyed account of one of the most pivotal periods of American history, revisiting the land he chronicled in \u003ci\u003eThe Worst Hard Time, \u003c\/i\u003ehis National Book Award winning account of the Dust Bowl.","brand":"Viking","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":54760306704750,"sku":"9780593834053","price":35.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0984\/1007\/0382\/files\/imageloader_5d8b5445-5918-413b-897b-74d4d6fa0a97.jpg?v=1789051486","url":"https:\/\/tenderbuttonsbooks.com\/products\/the-big-lonesome","provider":"Tender Buttons Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}