MIRA, $6.50, ISBN 0-7783-2013-8
Historical Romance, 2004

There is very little to say about Chieftain because it is a standard textbook example of a typical Native American romance that hasn’t made any significant evolution in plot since the bodice-ripper days, plot-wise. In fact, one can argue that with the story’s stronger emphasis on skanky elements like hero-and-ho sex and psychotic rantings of unbelievably monstrous white characters, this book probably fits the label of a trashy low-brow story better than the label of a romance novel.

There’s the standard selfless white heroine who cares obsessively about the Native American children, the unfortunately named Maggie Bankhead. Maggie is a schoolteacher in a Comanche reservation. Also in Fort Still is the halfbreed Shanaco who resents everything and just wants to be left alone with skanky women. These two don’t hit off right away as the author wants to show us Shanaco’s prowess with skanks first before hitting me in the head with how sex with a pure woman is better. Personally I find the skanky scenes much more, shall we say, savage and sensual than the annoying “Love Me Slowly, I’m a Delicate Virtuous Heroine Whose Uterus Must Be Handled Delicately if I’m to Give You 28 Children” scenes, but that’s just me, I guess.

Things come to a head (no, not that kind of head) when the Evil Slut, still bristling over the hero’s turning down her offer of more skanky sex, accuses Shanaco of rape. By then Maggie has already embarked on her Free the Native Americans sojourn and she is attracted to Shanaco, so oh no, how can this be, people? What can they do now? And by the way, always bet on a bedside healing sex  – more babies are made over these wounds in these stories than by any other circumstances.

Despite the overcooked hodge-podge of overblown familiar plot devices in this story, I have to confess though that there’s something very amusing about the overly dramatic and often purple prose. Chieftain is a throwback to the romance novels of the dark old days, where the villains are so unbelievably nasty that they probably bite off every fingers of their midwives the moment they were born, where titillation comes from skanky scenes, and conflicts that revolve mostly around how our heroine is purer than the hos and the psychos the hero consorts with keep piling up like some truly tragic highway accident.

Since Chieftain is one of those books that manage to be campy and unintentionally amusing as much as it is a really bad book by today’s standards, readers looking for some trashy low-brow fun may want to take a look at this one.