Winner of the 2018 Spur Award for Historical Novel
A sweeping historical novel of the American West that follows the
dramatic life of Daytime Smoke, Nez Perce son of explorer William
Clark.
The Coming is an epic novel of native-white relations in North
America, intimately told through the life of Daytime Smoke--the
real-life red-haired son of William Clark and a Nez Perce woman. In
1805, Lewis and Clark stumble out of the Rockies on the edge of
starvation. The Nez Perce help the explorers build canoes and navigate
the rapids of the Columbia, then spend two months hosting them the
following spring before leading them back across the snowbound
mountains. Daytime Smoke is born not long after, and the tribe of his
youth continues a deep friendship with white Americans, from fur
trappers to missionaries, even aiding the United States government in
wars with neighboring tribes. But when gold is discovered on Nez Perce
land in 1860, it sets an inevitable tragedy in motion.
Daytime Smoke's life spanned the seven decades between first contact and
the last great Indian war. Capturing the trajectory experienced by so
many native peoples--from friendship and cooperation to betrayal, war,
and genocide--this sweeping novel, with its large cast of characters and
vast geography, braids historical events with the drama of one man's
remarkable life. Rigorously researched and cinematically rendered, The
Coming is a page-turning, heart-stopping American novel in a classic
mode.
