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Scalp Mountain
It’s 1876 at Scalp Mountain and Colum McNeal is fleeing gunmen sent by his Irish-immigrant father. Colum pioneers a Texas ranch, a home which means everything to him, but struggles to stay there: José Ortero, a Jacarilla Apache, seeks revenge for the son Colum unwittingly killed.
At the same time, an old acquaintance, Mason Lohman, obsessively stalks Colum through the border country, planning to take his life. Colum has inspired the unthinkable in Lohman. In a time and place where a man’s sexuality must stand unchallenged, Colum has ignited Lohman’s desire.
Other characters include Texas Ranger William Henry, who takes Colum’s part against his father while wrestling with his own demons. Henry’s family was murdered by Comanches and he regrets the revenge he took;
and Clementine Weaver, who defies frontier prejudice by adopting an Indian baby, must choose between Colum and her husband.
Scalp Mountain is based on the Southern Plains’ Indian Wars.
Those wars were morally complex, and the novel attempts to reflect those profound, tragic and murderous complications.
Everyone was right, everyone was wrong, everyone got hurt.
At the same time, an old acquaintance, Mason Lohman, obsessively stalks Colum through the border country, planning to take his life. Colum has inspired the unthinkable in Lohman. In a time and place where a man’s sexuality must stand unchallenged, Colum has ignited Lohman’s desire.
Other characters include Texas Ranger William Henry, who takes Colum’s part against his father while wrestling with his own demons. Henry’s family was murdered by Comanches and he regrets the revenge he took;
and Clementine Weaver, who defies frontier prejudice by adopting an Indian baby, must choose between Colum and her husband.
Scalp Mountain is based on the Southern Plains’ Indian Wars.
Those wars were morally complex, and the novel attempts to reflect those profound, tragic and murderous complications.
Everyone was right, everyone was wrong, everyone got hurt.
- GenresHistorical Fiction
240 pages, Kindle Edition
First published February 19, 2012
51 people want to read
About the author
Julia Robb
12 books74 followersBecause my father was attending Centenary College, in Shreveport, Louisiana, when I was born, I was born in the Shreveport hospital. My parents are from Texas and we returned home when I was two weeks old. Not being born on Texas soil was a source of great shame for me as I was growing up (my four sisters and brothers knew this and teased me constantly). We Texans love our state. I have now lived in every part of Texas, actually, in fourteen towns (my dad was a Methodist pastor). I love the mesas which start past Waco, driving west, the Hill Country, with its bluebonnets, the tiny Czech and German towns where you can find the most delicious kolaches, and the Davis Mountains, green rolling hills. Most of all; I love The Big Bend, bordering Mexico with Chihuahuan desert, with the rugged Chisos Mountains crowned with Ponderosa Pine, with the serpentine Rio Grande.
I set "Scalp Mountain" and "Saint of the Burning Heart" in the Davis Mountains and The Big Bend. I called them something else, but that's where the heart of the books live, as does mine.
Scalp was published in Feb. 2012, Saint in Feb. 2013 and "Del Norte" in Dec. 2013.
I set "Scalp Mountain" and "Saint of the Burning Heart" in the Davis Mountains and The Big Bend. I called them something else, but that's where the heart of the books live, as does mine.
Scalp was published in Feb. 2012, Saint in Feb. 2013 and "Del Norte" in Dec. 2013.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
August 9, 2012
My Review
Scalp Mountain is historical fiction and I’m a big fan of this genre. Before writing this story, Julia Robb did extensive research about the history and geography of the region. It shows.
That said, this book has much in common with literary fiction. Throughout most of the story we see the vast expanse of the southern plains, the Guadalupe and Davis Mountains, Rio Grande River and surrounding territory. Julia Robb uses vivid, lyrical prose to show us this landscape. While reading, I was transported back to the 1870s. Her writing takes readers on a ride where they experience the story through all their senses; sight, sound, touch, smell and mental imagery through the use of beautiful word pictures.
Unlike romanticized Hollywood westerns of our parents’ time, in this story you’ll find good and bad on all sides. These truly are three dimensional characters; characters based in the realities of life, not cowboys in white hats and villains in black.
Characters define this story and lead us through the plot. In these characters we see complex personalities. Most of the story is presented through the eyes of the protagonist, Colum McNeal. Colum faces life and death situations from multiple characters who would love to kill him. He understands the motivation of two of them; revenge. Another, long time acquaintance, Mason Lohman is a mystery to him.
Julia Robb relies heavily on inner dialog. You’ll spend almost as much time inside these characters heads as you do watching the action taking place around them. There is a powerful psychological feel to the story.
That said, there are well executed fight scenes; those between individuals and between larger groups; from gun battles to knife fights, you’ll be at the center of the action in these fast paced, rapidly changing scenes.
Julia will help you see touching emotions from many of the characters; not just the protagonist. Much of the story is centered on pioneer settlers and their Native American rivals; other parts between Texas Rangers and the U.S. Cavalry. You’ll get a balanced, realist portrayal of each. Clementine Weaver, the wife of one of Colum’s neighbor, has adopted an Apache orphan. This orphan child is the son of José Ortero, a Jacarilla Apache and at one point we see his love for the child. Column is drawn to her as she nurses him through recovery after a brutal attack. His feelings become much more than sentimental.
Mankind has a history of brutality during war. Scalp Mountain doesn’t look the other way when it comes to violence. These scenes of gruesome violence will make you shudder at the harsh realities we humans foist upon one another. Atrocities occurred upon and from each of the opposing groups.
You’ll find things about the white pioneers and the Apaches you admire. I think you’ll come away with a fuller, richer understanding of the real dynamics of the late 1800s in West Texas.
The author has done thorough research and that research has paid dividends in this well written story about difficult times and circumstances.
This is an abbreviated review. For my complete review, visit http://richweatherly.wordpress.com/20...
Scalp Mountain is historical fiction and I’m a big fan of this genre. Before writing this story, Julia Robb did extensive research about the history and geography of the region. It shows.
That said, this book has much in common with literary fiction. Throughout most of the story we see the vast expanse of the southern plains, the Guadalupe and Davis Mountains, Rio Grande River and surrounding territory. Julia Robb uses vivid, lyrical prose to show us this landscape. While reading, I was transported back to the 1870s. Her writing takes readers on a ride where they experience the story through all their senses; sight, sound, touch, smell and mental imagery through the use of beautiful word pictures.
Unlike romanticized Hollywood westerns of our parents’ time, in this story you’ll find good and bad on all sides. These truly are three dimensional characters; characters based in the realities of life, not cowboys in white hats and villains in black.
Characters define this story and lead us through the plot. In these characters we see complex personalities. Most of the story is presented through the eyes of the protagonist, Colum McNeal. Colum faces life and death situations from multiple characters who would love to kill him. He understands the motivation of two of them; revenge. Another, long time acquaintance, Mason Lohman is a mystery to him.
Julia Robb relies heavily on inner dialog. You’ll spend almost as much time inside these characters heads as you do watching the action taking place around them. There is a powerful psychological feel to the story.
That said, there are well executed fight scenes; those between individuals and between larger groups; from gun battles to knife fights, you’ll be at the center of the action in these fast paced, rapidly changing scenes.
Julia will help you see touching emotions from many of the characters; not just the protagonist. Much of the story is centered on pioneer settlers and their Native American rivals; other parts between Texas Rangers and the U.S. Cavalry. You’ll get a balanced, realist portrayal of each. Clementine Weaver, the wife of one of Colum’s neighbor, has adopted an Apache orphan. This orphan child is the son of José Ortero, a Jacarilla Apache and at one point we see his love for the child. Column is drawn to her as she nurses him through recovery after a brutal attack. His feelings become much more than sentimental.
Mankind has a history of brutality during war. Scalp Mountain doesn’t look the other way when it comes to violence. These scenes of gruesome violence will make you shudder at the harsh realities we humans foist upon one another. Atrocities occurred upon and from each of the opposing groups.
You’ll find things about the white pioneers and the Apaches you admire. I think you’ll come away with a fuller, richer understanding of the real dynamics of the late 1800s in West Texas.
The author has done thorough research and that research has paid dividends in this well written story about difficult times and circumstances.
This is an abbreviated review. For my complete review, visit http://richweatherly.wordpress.com/20...
May 16, 2012
I love historical fiction but I can get tired of reading about the same places, people and events over and over again. I love when an author can take me to a new place and time. Julia Robb does just that with Scalp Mountain. The author takes us to late 1800s Texas and the surrounding areas. At that point in time, the middle part of the country was still wild. The white people who ventured out west from the East Coast were often the only people of their race for a long time. To say that there was tension between these white settlers and the Native Americans, who had been forced on to reservations by then, would be a complete understatement.
The book is really about the struggle between the white settlers and the Native Americans. I thought that Robb did a good job of making the reader feel the plight of both the white settlers and the Native Americans although the books mostly focuses on the white settlers and is therefore more sympathetic towards them.
I really liked the descriptions of life out on the frontier. There was so much going on, especially for poor Colum, one of the main characters in the book. His father sent a gunman after him after he thinks that Colum killed his own brother. Colum is also trying to flee the Native Americans. He leads an exciting life to say the least.
I also really liked Clementine's story. She is definitely a woman before her time. She's strong and resourceful and she doesn't worry too, too much about what other people say about her. She adopts a Native American child after he's found. This doesn't make her too popular with the other women around but she becomes completely dedicated to her son, James.
This is a good story about the not so pretty history of our country told in such a way that it will grab you and hold on to you until the very last page.
The book is really about the struggle between the white settlers and the Native Americans. I thought that Robb did a good job of making the reader feel the plight of both the white settlers and the Native Americans although the books mostly focuses on the white settlers and is therefore more sympathetic towards them.
I really liked the descriptions of life out on the frontier. There was so much going on, especially for poor Colum, one of the main characters in the book. His father sent a gunman after him after he thinks that Colum killed his own brother. Colum is also trying to flee the Native Americans. He leads an exciting life to say the least.
I also really liked Clementine's story. She is definitely a woman before her time. She's strong and resourceful and she doesn't worry too, too much about what other people say about her. She adopts a Native American child after he's found. This doesn't make her too popular with the other women around but she becomes completely dedicated to her son, James.
This is a good story about the not so pretty history of our country told in such a way that it will grab you and hold on to you until the very last page.
July 14, 2012
This is Western elivated to historical fiction. Scalp Mountain is set during the last desparate days of the Texan-Indian wars, and this book makes the whole thing come alive. It was long, it was bloody, and it was complicated. The main character, Colum McNeal, is a horse trader who can't get away from his past, or from the white murders on his trail, or his own personal tormenter. He falls in love with a woman. She's kidnapped by a bad Apache, and Colum goes on a personal mission to bring her home. Lots of violence, excellent inner dialog, wonderful descriptions of West Texas. Recommended.
May 26, 2019
Julia Robb doesn't need another review of her 2014 novel, Scalp Mountain, especially not from me. I don't read a lot of westerns, but I was delighted to discover that Robb's novel is a well-researched, authentic tale of what life was like in the untamed West in the late 1800s. The action doesn't dominate the narrative, but when Robb puts us in the middle of a conflict between two adversaries or takes us on a long trek to capture the renegade Jose Otero, we can see, smell and taste the scene. Some scenes in the novel are reminiscent of those in Lonesome Dove, and I was just as much engaged by Robb as I was by Larry McMurtry. That's no mean feat.
More enjoyable for me though were the episodes of internal dialogue and angst Robb provides for nearly every key character in the book. Yes, they sometimes slowed the plot, and I had to ask on occasion, is she going to give us the backstory of every character in the book? But in the end, we are privy to the innermost conflicts of the most important characters, and we come to know and understand then as complex, flawed people. For me that made them real. She shows us the bad in the good guys, and the good in the bad guys. So by the time we are through, we understand what makes these people who they are--in fact we often know them better than they know themselves.
My preference is literary novels, and I was pleasantly surprised to find Julia Robb has written one that's also a first rate western.
More enjoyable for me though were the episodes of internal dialogue and angst Robb provides for nearly every key character in the book. Yes, they sometimes slowed the plot, and I had to ask on occasion, is she going to give us the backstory of every character in the book? But in the end, we are privy to the innermost conflicts of the most important characters, and we come to know and understand then as complex, flawed people. For me that made them real. She shows us the bad in the good guys, and the good in the bad guys. So by the time we are through, we understand what makes these people who they are--in fact we often know them better than they know themselves.
My preference is literary novels, and I was pleasantly surprised to find Julia Robb has written one that's also a first rate western.
July 8, 2023
It's hard to keep interested.
Slow. Plot difficult to imagine then, suddenly it is moving on. I enjoyed the Spanish, American Indian and westerners combined. Just lost me too early.
Slow. Plot difficult to imagine then, suddenly it is moving on. I enjoyed the Spanish, American Indian and westerners combined. Just lost me too early.
April 29, 2013
The most intriguing novel of the west I have ever read.
Scalp Mountain introduces you to an era of no easy answers. The characters are realistically complex and the situations ring true. Julia Robb has written a novel that reflects the true strength and weakness of Texans and Comanches at a point in time where the both were struggling to survive each other. She draws you into the life of Colum McNeal as tries to come to grips with the things he has done in the midst of doing the things that he knows he needs to do. You will meet the men and women of Texas in the 1870's in a setting so real and anchored in real Texas history that it could have happened just this way. I cannot recommend this book strongly enough if you want a taste of real Texas life.
Scalp Mountain introduces you to an era of no easy answers. The characters are realistically complex and the situations ring true. Julia Robb has written a novel that reflects the true strength and weakness of Texans and Comanches at a point in time where the both were struggling to survive each other. She draws you into the life of Colum McNeal as tries to come to grips with the things he has done in the midst of doing the things that he knows he needs to do. You will meet the men and women of Texas in the 1870's in a setting so real and anchored in real Texas history that it could have happened just this way. I cannot recommend this book strongly enough if you want a taste of real Texas life.
May 18, 2014
Julia Robb’s novel Scalp Mountain, delves deeply into the Southern Plains’ Indian Wars. It takes place in 1876, and is rich in both its history and cultural understanding of both the time and people who populated this area during these morally complex times.
For anyone who loves a good tale of the old west, one that will bring to life the period with all its tragedy, murder, and prejudice that was rampant this is the book for you.
Ms. Robb paints a picture of life, love, and hate that will leave you breathless with anticipation for her next book. She is a master craftsman and it is difficult to believe she didn’t actually live in these times.
For anyone who loves a good tale of the old west, one that will bring to life the period with all its tragedy, murder, and prejudice that was rampant this is the book for you.
Ms. Robb paints a picture of life, love, and hate that will leave you breathless with anticipation for her next book. She is a master craftsman and it is difficult to believe she didn’t actually live in these times.
May 30, 2012
Read my review at my blog.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews