The Color Of Lightning: A Novel (p.S.) [Paperback]

From the Author of the National Book Award FinalistNews of the World

“Meticulously researched and beautifully crafted.... This is glorious work.” —Washington Post

“A gripping, deeply relevant book.” —New York Times Book Review

 From Paulette Jiles, author of the critically acclaimedNew York TimesbestsellersEnemy WomenandStormy Weather, comes a stirring work of fiction set on the untamed Texas frontier in the aftermath of the Civil War. One of only twelve books longlisted for the 2009 Scotiabank Giller Prize—one of Canada’s most prestigious literary awards—The Color of Lightningis a beautifully rendered and unforgettable re-examination of one of the darkest periods in U.S. history.

In 1863, as the War Between the States creeps inevitably toward its bloody conclusion, former Kentucky slave Britt Johnson ventures west into unknown territory with his wife, Mary, and their three children, searching for a life and a future. But their dreams are abruptly shattered by a brutal Indian raid upon the Johnsons' settlement while Britt is away establishing a business. Returning to find his friends and neighbors slain or captured, his eldest son dead, his beloved and severely damaged Mary enslaved, and his remaining children absorbed into an alien society that will never relinquish its hold on them, the heartsick freedman vows not to rest until his family is whole again.

A soaring work of the imagination based on oral histories of the post-Civil War years in North Texas, Paulette Jiles'sThe Color of Lightningis at once an intimate look into the hearts and hopes of tragically flawed human beings and a courageous reexamination of a dark American history.