David Fitz-Gerald
Frontier & Pioneer Western Fiction
Rathuun: King of the Prairie
A Western Frontier Adventure
There's an army of barking rifles...
and they're all pointed at Rathuun.
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Reading Rathuun?
Moments from the Prairie
A cliff edge crumbles beneath pounding hooves at Tongue Creek Canyon.
The herd surges forward, driven toward the brink of a buffalo jump at the Big Hole River.
With a whistle and a scream, a train chugs toward him at Sherman Hill.
Two bulls collide, fighting for dominance at the foot of the Grand Tetons.
A buffalo assassin stalks them. Hide hunters loom with knives in hand.
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Rathuun: King of the Prairie delivers action and adventure from the tip of one horn to the other.
Rathuun: King of the Prairie is an emotionally immersive, cinematic frontier story, combining the sweep of Dances with Wolves with the mythic depth of Watership Down.
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The chapters are packed with danger and thunder past like a stampede.
Book Trailer
Book Description
With all the swagger of a classic western, a legendary buffalo claims his rightful place among the genre's most iconic heroes.
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Meet Rathuun. Born in an idyllic canyon, tragedy strikes on his first day. A grizzly bear scatters the herd, devours his twin, and leaves him to shiver and die. But the buffalo calf survives.
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The plains are changing fast. Wagons roll west in endless streams. Telegraph wires stretch across the horizon. Locomotives scream down polished rails, slicing through the earth. Extinction seems imminent when everyone wants to kill the biggest buffalo on the prairie. Native people shoot arrows and drive herds over cliffs. Hide hunters slaughter millions. An obsessed buffalo assassin is determined to wipe them all out and change the world forever. There's an army of barking rifles, and they're all pointed at Rathuun.
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Will the hunters take Rathuun's head and leave his carcass to rot on the prairie?
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This sweeping epic thunders across the American West, taking readers to unforgettable western landmarks. If you like classic westerns, thrilling action, and high-stakes historical adventures, grab your copy now.
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Welcome to the Prairie!
Excerpt
From Chapter 1, opening scene
Rathuun heard a fierce roar that rattled between his ears.
He had just finished nursing for the first time since he was born a thrum, hours earlier. His mother’s warm breath had tickled his flank just moments ago.
It was a peaceful morning on the prairie, but in a flash, everything had changed.
The thunderous roar boomed again. The entire brum was on the move.
In his haste to lead his followers away from danger, Drumm sounded the alarm and leapt forward. The old bull crashed into Rathuun, sending the thrum sprawling.
Rathuun’s legs wobbled as he tried to stand. It was a miracle that the collision hadn’t broken him. There was an instinctive pull to follow the brum, and it was centered beneath his chin, between his front legs.
He blinked rapidly, whipping his head from side to side, searching for his mother. Moments ago, she had been beside him. “Hathah!” he bleated, searching for the young cow who was his whole world.
But he knew she was gone. Gone with all the others. Why had she left him behind?
He shivered at the realization that he was all alone. His heart throbbed against his ribs. It was a struggle to make sense of what had happened.
Everything turned upside down and sideways. The panicked brum quickly vanished as the plains swallowed the pounding hooves and flashing tails, leaving nothing but a faint echo of their distant bellows.
It was eerily silent in the wake of the wild scatter of the buffalos’ frenzied exodus. Rathuun took a tentative step forward, not knowing what to do or which way to go.
Dust choked the air. His third, translucent eyelid swept sideways across his eye, clearing away the grit kicked up by the fleeing brum. He stood, dazed and completely alone.
Or so he thought. The silence quickly gave way to horrible sounds.
Rathuun turned his head. Twenty feet away, something moved. A dark, hulking monster hunched over something. Rathuun’s blood pounded with fear. There was a heavy thump in his chest. Then he saw the creature.
It was a rumbler.