Way Station 60-198

I really enjoyed this fictional western by Michael D. George, or as "first published in Great Britain in 1999 under the name Roy Patterson". The story concerns a place called Indian Wells Way Station. A large, red sod fortress enclosed with high walls. Within are an office, dining area, kitchen, 7 rooms with 2 cots each, plus a bunkhouse and corral. The corral contains at least 12 mounts to replace the tired ones coming in on the stage. There is also a water tower within the 100 yards by 100 yards enclosure. Two stages daily, one coming from the east the other from the west stop here for both food and fresh horses. The Pony Express stops here too at least once each week. Fort Bravos is a fast 20 minutes or so away by horse and the town Sundance lies to east of Indian Wells Way Station. The way station will soon be under seige by both the Blackfeet and Cheyenne Indians from the Indian Territory reservation. Besides the seige which takes up the majority of the book, a murder occurs and the Army payroll has been stolen. So we have both a western and a mystery rolled into one. Both a great plot and a great read. Anyone enjoying the old black and white movies of yesterday will find this book interesting. Some rough edges, however, do appear in this novel keeping it from being a 'historical' western. The date of the story has to be between 1860 and 1861 as the Pony Express only ran for a year or so prior to the American Civil War. With that date in mind, the mentioning of the 'Ghost Dance' being behind the Indian attacks will not work, as the earliest recorded date for the Ghost Dance activity is 1870 and as late as 1890. Remember the book is clearly dated by the April, 1860-October, 1861, Pony Express dates, the Pony Express had routes between St Joseph, Missouri, to Sacramento, California. The book is correct that the mail contracts eventually transitioned over to the stagecoaches. A couple other irregularities concern the Blackfeet and Cheyenne being on the same reservation. Firstly 1860-1861 would be too early for this type of incarceration which generally did not encompass the plains tribes until after the Civil War in 1865 or much later. Secondly, the Blackfeet (Blood, Siksika, and Piegan) proper were on reservations in both Montana and Canada, finding the Northern Cheyennes much further east and south with their 'cousin' the Lakota (Sioux) tribes making up the Lakota Nation. Possibly this could work if the Blackfeet of this story are the Sihasapas or Lakota "Black Feet" smaller parts of the Lakota Nation living in northern Lakota territory. Since the author does not stipulate it is somewhat confusing. I don't want to be to strick or unfair to this book for after all it IS a work of fiction for enjoyment, and for me in that goal it more than succeeds. However, as a work of historical fiction as pointed out it has its drawbacks. So fellow western readers accept this book as the tremendous fictional story that it offers, but b