UNBRIDLED

Two brothers—one a criminal and the other a gentleman—find their sibling rivalry taking on dangerous dimensions in Springer’s historical novel.

Both Cyrus Caine and his younger brother Morgan grow up around horses; their father, Cyrus Sr., is an experienced horse trainer. In 1933, after a heated argument (and a “lifetime of hate”), 13-year-old Cyrus kills his father and sets alight the stable that becomes his grave. Cyrus and Morgan, who’s 10, flee the Kentucky stables in which they worked, hoping to reach Chicago, but the truck they steal from their father runs out of gas. George “Doc” Reese, the owner of Harmony Farm & Stables, takes the brothers in, and they eventually become both his wards and employees. Cyrus is a “magician” with horses, but he’s also a cruel, nihilistic boy who eventually goes to prison for raping a 15-year-old girl. Morgan, on the other hand, enlists in the military after Pearl Harbor is attacked and returns home a war hero. In this psychologically searching novel, the two brothers follow parallel but starkly different paths—both become successful entrepreneurs breeding and racing horses, but Cyrus is a disreputable gangster while Morgan is a beloved pillar of the community. Cyrus grows especially resentful when Morgan marries Kat, George Reese’s granddaughter, and the two become an admired “Golden Couple.” The author’s development of the contrasting brothers (whose acrimony is obviously inspired by the biblical tale of Cain and Abel) is artistically subtle: Morgan is sired by a different father, and one can help but wonder if this is the source of his moral instincts. The story covers a great expanse of time but moves at a gripping pace; the plot finally crescendos in grim acts of violence that feel neither cheap nor gratuitous. This is a work of impressive narrative nuance and restraint.

An engrossing novel that ambitiously tackles big moral and philosophical issues.