GHOST WARRIOR

Seventh in Robson’s phosphorescently magnificent gallery of forgotten women whom she’s dug up God knows where—even as far off as feudal Japan in The Tokaido Road. In the brook-clear historical fiction of Fearless (1998), she tells the fact-based story of Sarah Borginnis Bowman, six-foot with cayenne hair, who becomes an Army Woman with Zachary Taylor and follows him through battle after battle in the Southwest. In Mary’s Land (1995), we are drawn into the timeless bravery of Margaret Brent in the settling of Maryland as she oversees tobacco crops, balances a household, and keeps a weather eye on the parliament. Now Robson has discovered Lozen, unmarried sister of Chiricahua Apache chief Victorio. Blessed with horse magic and the gifts of healing and far-sight (she can see enemies farther off than anyone else), she becomes not only the legendary and battle-hardened woman fighter of the Apaches but Victorio’s wise counselor as well and his veritable right hand until his death, when she joins Geronimo. The Chiricahua are against everybody and at war with the universe, a wonderful people who bear great names: Talks A Lot, Ears So Big, He Steals Love, Flies in His Soup, and Flattened Penis. Don’t miss the immensely amusing chapter “Rear Guard,” in which the Apaches lift their breechclouts, “presenting their attackers with a long row of bare, brown backsides. They beat a tattoo on them, all the while hooting and shouting insults.”

A great main character, immense moral tragedy, all sung with full lungs.