Bury My Heart at Redtree

Title: Bury My Heart at Redtree
Author: Patrick Chalfant
Genre: Suspense/Thriller
ISBN: 1-930709-53-6

Patrick Chalfant weaves a tale that is a mixture of psychological suspense, Native American mysticism and revenge in his sophomore novel Bury My Heart at Redtree. Redtree follows Taylor, a promising young psychology student as he builds his masters thesis around the revenge he has planned for those who are responsible for his parent's death.

Taylor is aided in his vigilante justice by his friends Elijah and Keith and hunted by the local authorities, detectives Stan Jennings and Carol Parker of the State Bureau of Investigations. With a cast of a characters that also includes a naïve, yet insightful girlfriend, a mystical and manipulative Native American chief and a business man with shady dealings that could put Kenneth Lay to shame, Bury my Heart at Redtree is entertaining, suspenseful and exciting, albeit a little predictable and underdeveloped.

Chalfant's use of Freudian psychology as a plot device is original and ingenious as Taylor uses his criminal spree as a means to prove his thesis regarding Freud's idea of the id, ego and superego. Also, the opening sequence of Redtree, a daring and bloody convenience store hit, is one of the best opening sequences of a novel I have ever read. And I must say Gayland, the resident wealthy business man and all out bad guy is a well written and deliciously evil, villain. You love to hate him and hope and pray that he gets what he deserves.

Redtree manages to be fresh and engaging in a genre that can easily be stale and unoriginal and that is all do to Chalfant's masterful storytelling and innovative use of the old themes of revenge and redemption.

However, Redtree does have some problems, the biggest of which is Chalfant's lack of character development. With so many characters you don't expect to be up close and personal with everyone but the main characters, particularly Taylor and Jennings should feel like close friends, or at the very least people you'd care about if something happened to them and that closeness just isn't there.

Chalfant doesn't offer much in the way of motivation or understanding for their behavior or their thoughts, so as a reader you don't have much stake in what happens to them good or bad. He does a great job at portraying Gayland as a corrupt and soulless man but lacks the same depth with the rest of the characters and that lack of depth ultimately hurts the story he's trying to tell.

Also the novel gets a little too preachy, as the subplot about a high profile drug case becomes the springboard for a rant on the criminal justice system and how with enough money and the right attorneys one can get away with anything. It is fine to feel passionate about a topic but not too many people like to be preached to and after awhile the rants about the justice system just felt like a combination of whining and preaching.

Despite these criticisms Bury My Heart at Redtree is worth your time and money. It's a good and fast read and while the surprise ending isn't really a surprise you'll still find it satisfying and fulfilling.

Tamika Johnson is a freelance writer and owner of PrologueReviews.com. To read more reviews by Tamika or to have your book, movie or film reviewed visit http://www.prologuereviews.com

More Resources

Unable to open RSS Feed $XMLfilename with error HTTP ERROR: 404, exiting

More Book Reviews Information:

Related Articles

Star - Book Review
Tom Peters crafted a moving, educational animal adventure story in his novel Star. This is a dog-lover's fiction - written for a young adult audience.
IZEE Growing Up In A Logging Camp: Chapter One
Chapter OneI was ready to start the fourth grade, the year we moved to Izee. Prior to that time, the Miles family had lived in Bates, Oregon.
The Wal-Mart Decade - AchieveMax® Top Ten Book Review
The Wal-Mart Decade: How a New Generation of Leaders Turned Sam Walton's Legacy into the World's #1 Company was destined for publication. It was simply a matter of when it would be written and by whom.
The Letter Writer: Book Review
"I enjoyed reading this book. The characters were portrayed very well.
The World is Flat - This Book by Thomas L Friedman has Taken the Online Entrepreneurs by Storm
The New York Times' columnist visits India often. I read about his new book The World is Flat in his interview with a leading Indian National newspaper.
Change Your Thinking, Change Your Life - AchieveMax® Top Ten Book Review
Change Your Thinking, Change Your Life is another book focusing on the obvious. We've heard it all before.
The Power of 2 - AchieveMax® Top Ten Book Review
The Power of 2: Win Big with People in Your Work and in Life by Anthony C. ScireHere is another in a growing number of "mini-books," 170 pages in this case, which seem to be taking over book store shelves from coast to coast.
The Leadership Pill - AchieveMax® Top Ten Book Review
The Leadership Pill is another volume for those of you anxious to add to your library of "mini-books." Ken Blanchard, a veritable self-help book-writing machine, partners with co-author Marc Muchnick to create this 112-page parable that every leader will want to read and share with those he/she mentors.
Book Summary: How To Work With Just About Anyone
"I just can't seem to get along with this person!"Every office has that one difficult person to work with, who affects productivity due to a terrible attitude, chronic tardiness, or simply drives everyone else up the wall. Here is the answer to common problems in conflict management.
72 Hour Hold
Bebe Moore Campbell weaves a tale of unrelenting love and pain in her latest novel 72 Hour Hold. 72 Hour Hold tells the story of Keri, a successful owner of an upscale Los Angeles Boutique whose beautiful, intelligent 18 year old daughter has been diagnosed with bi-polar disorder.
Why The Dems Can't Stand Tom Delay & Tim LaHaye
THE MORAL OF THE STORYLou Dubose and Jan Reid's new book, THE HAMMER, a biography on House of Representatives Majority Whip Tom DeLay, is allegedly a story of God, Money, and the Rise of the Republican Congress-and just how Tom DeLay took advantage of Newt Gingrich and fellow Texan Dick Armey's Republican ascendancy and became himself the most powerful man in the House of Representatives. We'll get into the "God part" a lot more than the money and political parts for now-but just to warn you, the King of Tyre (money) and the King of Babylon (political power) have a whole lot to do about this most interesting story.
Ideas Are Free - A Book Summary
Without great ideas, no organization can stay afloat, much less flourish. Managers and top executives are constantly struggling to come up with big ones - creative marketing strategies, ingenious cost-cutting schemes and other corporate solutions that will save time and money and improve productivity.
Story Structure - Three Heroes
Three Heroes Story Structure follows the Hero's Journey mould but distinguishes itself by making both the hero and the shape shifter both likeable and deserving of the final prize.The Classic Hero's Journey also makes the shape shifter likeable and deserving of the prize but in Three Heroes, we get more of the Shape Shifter's back-story and surprisingly little of the Hero's.
Critical Condition: How Health Care In America Became Big Business-And Bad Medicine:
Title: Critical Condition: How Health Care In America Became Big Business-And Bad Medicine:Authors: Donald L. Barlett and James B.
Book Summary: Good To Great
Explore what goes into a company's transformation from mediocre to excellent. Based on hard evidence and volumes of data, the book author (Jim Collins) and his team uncover timeless principles on how the good-to-great companies like Abbott, Circuit City, Fannie Mae, Gillette, Kimberly-Clark, Kroger, Nucor, Philip Morris, Pitney Bowes, Walgreens, and Wells Fargo produced sustained great results and achieved enduring greatness, evolving into companies that were indeed 'Built to Last'.
Book Review: If You Are Over Fifty, You Are Entitled To Some Very Interesting Discounts On Travel:
Title: Unbelievably Good Deals and Great Adventures That You Absolutely Can't Get Unless You're Over 50 (2005-2006Author: Joan Rattner HeilmanISBN: 0071438297Publishers: McGraw-Hill:The following review was contributed by: NORM GOLDMAN: Editor of Bookpleasures.REVIEWNo age group represents such an enormous market of potential consumers than those over the age of fifty.
The Leadership Challenge - AchieveMax® Top Ten Book Review
The Leadership Challenge: The Most Trusted Source on Becoming a Better Leader by James M. Kouzes & Barry Z.
A Coaching Book Review
Win-Win Partnerships - Be on the Leading Edge with Synergistic CoachingWin-Win Partnerships takes Coaching and Partnering to a new level. This book explores much more than employer/employee relationships.
Review: Profit From The Author Inside You
I've reviewed a number of eBooks recently, and none of themexcited me, but this one definitely did. If you've ever hadthe slightest desire to write a 'How To' book, I urge youto read 'Profit From The Author Inside You'.
Be the Leader - AchieveMax® Top Ten Book Review
The author of Be the Leader: Make the Difference, a "manual for leaders," speaks not from theory and research alone. Paul B.