Custer and the Little Bighorn The man, the mystery, the myth

Custer continues to intrigue us long after the Battle of Little Big Horn. It is not as if startling new revelations issue forth, for the official reports, Indian accounts, and anecdotal accounts of varying reliability have been examined and repeatedly reexamined. Of course, the variable in any new analysis is the interpretation of and weight one gives to the accounts. Donovan is the author of several books, a literary agent, and a longtime Custer buff. Unlike many recent accounts, especially Evan S. Connell's Son of the Morning Star (1984), Donovan restores Custer as the pivotal figure in the chain of events. He devotes substantial space to descriptions of Custer's early life, Civil War exploits, and personality quirks. Donovan sees a direct line of causation between Custer's experiences and character and his defeat at Little Big Horn and diminishes the factors of Indian resistance and the errors of Custer's superiors and subordinates. Still, Donovan's utilization of recent time-motion studies and his reinterpretation of various Indian accounts lead him to interesting but hardly definitive conclusions. --Jay Freeman

"The line is paper-thin between audacity, one of the greatest of all military virtues, and recklessness, one of the greatest vices," proclaims Richard S. Wheeler in his foreword to Custer and the Little Bighorn: The Man, the Mystery, the Myth by Jim Donovan. The Dallas literary agent and motivational author (This Is Your Life, Not a Dress Rehearsal) explores possible reasons for Custer's seemingly unnecessary risk and the hundreds of resulting deaths. A plethora of b&w photos, paintings and maps, and prominent endorsement by historical novelists Wheeler and Larry McMurtry (with a quotation on the cover) will attract a large lay audience, though the book has enough spade work to attract scholars. ( June) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

There has been a need for a new popular biography of George Custer to take into account the recent research and archaeological studies. Literary agent Donovan makes a valiant attempt here but falls a bit short of the mark with this lavishly illustrated biography. He covers the essentials of Custer's life in a fast-paced narrative, incorporating recent research as needed to give a good overview of the man and his times. However, when discussing the Battle of the Little Bighorn, he trades probability for certainty and subtly alters the probable chronology so that Custer is among the last to die (scholars now think that Miles Keogh deserves that distinction). Portraits of Custer and his family, fellow officers, and Confederate and Indian foes also enliven the text. For public libraries; academic libraries should rely on Jeffrey Wert's Custer (LJ 6/1/96). (Photos not seen.) Stephen H. Peters, Northern Michigan Univ. Lib., Marquette (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.