The Year the Cloud Fell

The Year the Cloud Fell, Kurt R.A. Giambastiani, Roc Books, 2001

Set in the 1880s, this alternate history novel is about the American march westward. The US was happily expanding its territory until it ran into a brick wall called the Cheyenne Alliance. For the previous 80 years, all attempts by the Americans, the British to the north, and the Spanish to the south, to expand into Alliance territory have been foiled. President George Custer sends his son, Army Captain George Jr, up in an experimental dirigible to find the Cheyenne. It comes down in a thunderstorm, and George Jr is captured by the Cheyenne.

He isn't killed immediately, even though he is the son of Long-Hair (Custer), because one of the Cheyenne women, Speaks While Leaving, had a vision several years previously, of a white man who fell from the sky and would help her people. But George Jr is still a loyal member of the US military. Slowly, his attitude toward the Cheyenne starts to change.

Back in Washington, imagining all sorts of horrible things happening to his son, George Sr asks Congress for authority to change the undeclared war against the Cheyenne into a declared war. Later, the Cheyenne camp is found by the US cavalry and its leaders are invited to what is supposed to be a peace
conference at a site on the Missouri River. While the conference is going on, the undefended Cheyenne camp is attacked by the cavalry. Heavy casualties are inflicted on the Cheyenne women and children, but the cavalry also suffers heavy casualties when the Indian warriors, led by George Jr, get back almost too late.

Seeing the aftermath of the US attack, George Jr throws away all loyalty to the US government and thinks up a bold plan to, figuratively, force the Indians down Washington's, and his father's, throat.

This is an all-around very good story. The look inside Cheyenne culture feels accurate, there is enough action for anyone, and the characters seem like real people. On more than one level, this one is worth reading.