This author participates in the Readers' Favorite Free Book Program, which is open to all readers and is completely free. The author will provide you with a free copy of their book in exchange for an honest review. You and the author will discuss what sites you will post your review to and what kind of copy of the book you would like to receive (eBook, PDF, Word, paperback, etc.). To begin, click the purple email icon to send this author a private email.
This author participates in the Readers' Favorite Book Review Exchange Program, which is open to all authors and is completely free. Simply put, you agree to provide an honest review an author's book in exchange for the author doing the same for you. What sites your reviews are posted on (B&N, Amazon, etc.) and whether you send digital (eBook, PDF, Word, etc.) or hard copies of your books to each other for review is up to you. To begin, click the purple email icon to send this author a private email, and be sure to describe your book or include a link to your Readers' Favorite review page or Amazon page.
This author participates in the Readers' Favorite Book Donation Program, which was created to help nonprofit and charitable organizations (schools, libraries, convalescent homes, soldier donation programs, etc.) by providing them with free books and to help authors garner more exposure for their work. This author is willing to donate free copies of their book in exchange for reviews (if circumstances allow) and the knowledge that their book is being read and enjoyed. To begin, click the purple email icon to send this author a private email. Be sure to tell the author who you are, what organization you are with, how many books you need, how they will be used, and the number of reviews, if any, you would be able to provide.
Author Kae Cheatham (a.k.a. K. Follis Cheatham) has published more than a dozen books of fiction and nonfiction. Her juveniles' biography, of American Indian activist Dennis Banks, was a SPUR Award Finalist. Poetry and articles have appeared in many national publications. She has edited for publishing houses and magazines, and worked as a writer/photographer stringer for a rodeo magazine.
The major focus in her historical fiction is Minorities in the West. She attended Ohio State University and majored in History and English. A retired, 28-year member of Western Writers of America, Kae freelances as an editor and book layout specialist.
Her young-reader book, *Spotted Flower and the Ponokomita* is in the second printing of the second edition and is the basis for her Humanities Montana (HM) presentation "Before the Horse." She has been part of the HM Speakers Bureau since 2004.
Reviewed by Alice DiNizo for Readers' Favorite
"Hammer Come Down" begins in Alabama in the 1830's. President Andrew Jackson has ordered Native Americans to relocate from their eastern and southern American locales to the Western territories. Jason, an African-American bondsman to Tolin Cobb, returns with Tolin from the Seminole wars in Florida to their home in Union Springs, Alabama, which is southwest of Montgomery, only to find that Tolin's plantation home has been burned and everyone they know has disappeared or has been killed. It seems that soldiers killed the blacks who fired upon them from the Cobb plantation and the local Creeks then headed to the western territories with horses and whoever was still living, Jason's beloved Louisa among them. Tolin is heartbroken as is Jason, so Tolin sells the land or what is left of his home, while Jason, trained as a blacksmith, creates a sign for the cemetery where the Cobbs and their beloved African-American bondsmen are buried. Then Tolin and Jason head for the western territories and Fort Laramie. Tolin gives Jason the papers declaring him a freedman as they begin their adventures in a land where the only settlers are "trashy renegade white men, crackers without money and, niggers with a rope waiting for them."
"Hammer Come Down" is a brilliantly written account of the western territories of the United States in those few decades before the Civil War. With realistic dialogue and believable action it tells of the variety of immigrants like African-American Jason and white southern Tolin who try to settle there along with a few nefarious characters and also the Cheyenne, Crow, Creeks and other Native Americans. Jason, his friend Tolin Cobb, the abolitionist Johnston family of Maple Lane, Louisa and her adopted father Oneechee, Jason's adopted orphan Philip and all the other characters are believable. The portrayal of the historical time period is perfect. The plot line is multifaceted and complex as Jason and Tolin make their way out West as well as into their adult years when they decide to live the life they really want. "Hammer Come Down" is an incredible read that should go on every reader's list of "must reads" today.
