Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier

A young Confederate war soldier (Inman) goes AWOL and begins a long journey home to the mountains of North Carolina to his long lost love (Ada).  Along the way he meets marauders, bandits, guards looking for outliers, an old witch, a family who tries to turn him in for the reward, a wayward preacher, a young woman whose husband was killed in the war, among many others.  Meanwhile, back home Ada is trying to survive on her fathers farm hopelessly until a young half-Cherokee woman (Ruby)comes to her aid.  A great read and I can't wait to see the movie. 

Buffalo Girls by Larry McMurtry

"I am the wild west, no show about it.  I was one of the people who kept it wild...."  Calamity Jane.  An old woman in Montana mud writes a letter to her daughter in the East.  Her name is Martha Jane, but everyone in the west calls her Calamity.  This is the story of Calamity's last days.  Here you will find Indians, beaver hunters, saloons, gunfighters, frontier history, everything you could possibly want in a western.  Calamity Jane and Annie Oakley along with other Western legends go with Buffalo Bill Cody to London to play in the Great Wild West Show.  I love Larry McMurtry and everything I have read by him has been exciting and well written. 

                                                           

Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston

Their Eyes Were Watching God.  Zora Neale Hurston wrote in a rich cultural style that I have read no where else.  She fluently goes from 3rd person proper English to Old Harlem black slang.  This book is considered to be the autobiography of the author, however I believe it is also considered to be fiction. The story is set in the South, in the 1920s, with the main character being a young woman named Janey.  Janey first lives with her old grandmother who marries her off to an older man who is very abusive to her.  She runs off with a another man to Southern Florida where they open a mercantile type store in the Everglades.  She lives with this man for years until his death.  She continues to run the store until a young man comes in one day and steals her heart.  She lives with him until a great hurricane comes and breaks open the lake and they along with others make a break North on foot.  Absolutey wonderful!  Its been a long time since I read something so rich and cultural.  Every character is full of life.  Ms. Hurston has been ridiculed by her peers for not giving her black characters the normal self-pity and white hatred that is so popular among many black authors.