Back in 1836, Comanches rode over the prairie to a tiny Texas settlement and slaughtered five men. They carted off five others, among them a nine-year-old girl. Astonishingly, 24 years later, she was rescued by soldiers and Texas Rangers and returned to her family. She died in relative obscurity, but her surviving son represents one of the very last Comanche warriors and the Native American responsible for brooking a reconciliation between whites and the Native population.

Frankel takes that story and explores every facet of it when it was turned into The Searchers in the 1950s, a novel by Alan LeMay that would in turn become a Hollywood film starring John Wayne and directed by the brilliant John Ford.

This fascinating book weaves together historic fact and fanciful storytelling, elements bound up in national mythmaking. Frankel moves well between telling the woeful tale of Cynthia Ann Parker, the young girl carried away with Comanche warriors and the film that would ultimately be made years later.