Children of the Dust

Set during the Oklahoma land rush of the 1880s, this novel tells the interlocking stories of dispossessed Indians and newly-freed blacks. Gypsy Smith, a mixed-blood black-Cherokee gunfighter and lawman seeks revenge after he is attacked by the Klu Klux Klan and left for dead. Schoolteacher John Maxwell, who teaches Indians that they must conform to the ways of the white man in order to survive, is forced to confront his convictions when his daughter falls in love with a Cheyenne boy.