Emma Bull

You may not think that fantasy and western genres would blend well … think again!

The opening scene of Territory by Emma Bull features a recently shot cowboy being lain across Doc Holliday’s poker table. The fun only continues from there because this book has it all: cowboys and Chinese magicians, saloon girls and East Coast society debutantes, desperate rides and raging fires, stagecoach robberies and horse taming. Bull’s writing expertly transports you to another time and place.

The story takes place in the weeks leading up to the infamous shootout at the O.K. Corral. The Old West, and Tombstone in particular, are not topics that I know much about. I recognized the names of Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday, but had to look up the Clanton brothers and the McLaureys on Wikipedia to appreciate all the nuances of this beautifully written novel that’s chock-full of magical realism. Only this story isn’t exactly the one that I researched online or that you may have watched on the big screen. In Bull’s take, people who possess an innate affinity for the earth can use natural resources in supernatural ways. The rich veins of silver in and around Tombstone have lured several such men to the territory, and their struggles for dominance lead this tale toward its inevitable conclusion.

The two main characters, Mildred Benjamin and Jesse Fox, are purely fictional. Mildred, the educated Jewish widow of a Civil War veteran, supports herself by working at one of the local newspapers. Jesse Fox is supposedly just a drifter headed through town on his way to Mexico, until he finds his old friend and mentor in the local Chinatown. Chow Lung has been trying to get Jesse to admit to sorcerous powers for quite some time, with little success. Events in Tombstone make it impossible for Jesse to continue to deny his magic. And, the genteel romance that blooms between Mildred and Jesse only serves to entangle him further in local affairs.

Territory offers a strange mix of the familiar and the completely foreign. Bull lifts a chapter out of American history and makes it come alive, adding her own twists for good measure.

Kristen Blount – Administration Office