Coal Black Horse

October 23, 2006
Olmstead's new work (after Stay Here with Me
) is a convulsive, bloody Civil War tale that tracks a boy's search for his father on the battlefield at Gettysburg. At 14, Robey Childs is on the cusp of manhood when he sets off from the family farm at his mother's behest to find his soldier father and bring him home. A sympathetic farmer loans Robey an uncommonly beautiful and sturdy black horse. On the road, Robey passes carts carrying the maimed and dead, and bands of Native Americans and runaway slaves. A chain of horrific trials begins for Robey when a man dressed as a woman shoots him and steals the horse. He's taken prisoner as a suspected spy, witnesses a girl's rape and is caught up in a carnage-drenched raid. However, he survives the attack, is reunited with the stolen horse and sets out again, days later finding his father on the battlefield, mortally wounded. Robey can't save his father, but he can try to save the raped girl, Rachel, from further violence. His return home and his testimony to what he saw forms a powerful, redemptive narrative.

November 15, 2006
A coming-of-age story whose grim background is the Civil War, this work by Olmstead ("River Dog: Stories") follows 14-year-old Robey Childs on his quest to locate his father, a soldier in that war. His mother's premonition sets him on the journey, with no money, no clear direction, and just a worn-out horse to ride. Robey's fortune in coming across an extraordinary horse to accompany him is soon cancelled when the horse is violently taken from him, and he experiences privation and sorrow as he tries to reconnect with the horse and locate his dying father on the battlefield. Sparsely told and graphically depicted, Robey's journey is a small-scale epic that will find a broad audience in public library fans of Civil War historical fiction.Ann H. Fisher, Radford P.L., VA

Copyright 2006 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

January 1, 2007
Olmstead has fashioned an absorbing tale that is a cross between two of the most respected and widely read Civil War novels. Combining elements of the rite-of-passage motif employed by Stephen Crane in " The Red Badge of Courage" with the classic odyssey plot device recycled so effectively by Charles Frazier in " Cold Mountain" (1997), he has provided a fresh perspective on an old--but never timeworn--subject. When 14-year-old Robey Child is sent by his mother to search for his father, a doomed soldier, he witnesses the horrors of war both on and off the battlefield. Arrayed in a jacket (gray on one side, blue on the other) custom made by his mother and riding a talismanic coal black horse, he embarks upon a life-altering journey that will challenge him physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Olmstead does not shy away from the brutal reality of warfare, and his starkly powerful descriptions of violence and carnage are harrowing. Civil War buffs will appreciate the attention to detail; general readers will be mesmerized by the powerfully evocative journey.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2007, American Library Association.)