Response to Ned Christie’s War

Though Ned Christie’s War by Robert Conley was a fairly easy read, I can’t say I enjoyed it all that much. I admit it is a nice respite from the difficulty and more serious nature of the other two books, but I do not feel that it offered us as much as the other two books. From talking to other people I’ve been told that they didn’t think we read it at the right point in the course, many felt like they could have used more of a historical Cherokee background first before tackling this book. Luckily I already knew some of the information we are learning through the Coates class from taking a Native American studies course last year. I have not read Cherokee Thoughts Honest and Uncensored, so I can’t really comment on his writing style in comparison, still I tend to agree with Becky that Conley seems to be writing this book with a bit of a bias. It had some useful historical information and it was interesting to read about Cherokee marbles since I know we are going to be playing it eventually, but overall I don’t think I would recommend this book be used again next year. Though, if it was to be used I definitely think it should be discussed more in class so some useful discussion can be generated about it.