Book Review for Shoot the Horses First by Leah Angstman
Title of the book: Shoot the Horses First; HistoriesAuthor: Leah Angstman
Publisher: Kernpunkt Press
Publishing Date: 2023
ISBN: 9781734306590
Summary:
***Winner of the Shorts Award for Americana Fiction***
Through a historian’s lens and folkloric storytelling, the pieces in SHOOT THE HORSES FIRST revel in the nuances, brutality, mythology, and tiny victories of our historical past. A launderer takes us inside the linens of the richest families in early Baltimore. A child on the Orphan Train has his teeth inspected like a horse. Civil War soldiers experience PTSD. While one woman lands on an island of the Wampanoag tribe, a woman 200 years later finds Apache in a harsh frontier. Children survive yellow fever, the desert heat, and mistaken identities; men survive severed fingers, untested medicines, and wives with obsessive compulsive disorders. Frederick Douglass’ grandson plays violin at the World’s Fair on Colored American Day, a woman with disabilities is kept hidden away like she doesn’t exist, and a botanist is denied her place in a science journal because she is female. Themes of place, war, mental illness, identity, disability, feminism, and unyielding optimism throughout harrowing desperation resurface in this collection of stories that takes us back to time immemorial, yet feels so close, and all too familiar.
PRAISE
“I’m astonished by the historical breadth in this collection of stories and by the sensibility that unites them. It’s a thrill to be dropped, so vividly, into such a wide variety of settings and periods—and even more of a thrill to discover the strong new voice of Leah Angstman. Read it!”
—Ethan Rutherford, author of FARTHEST SOUTH and THE PERIPATETIC COFFIN AND OTHER STORIES
“In SHOOT THE HORSES FIRST, Leah Angstman blasts readers from the Twitterfied nowscape into the manifest past—to an America connected by the burgeoning railroad and shattered by civil war. As inventive and complex as the era itself, these sixteen fictions of nineteenth-century friction contain surprises on every page. Whether it’s an impromptu snowball fight on a battlefield during a ceasefire or a wayward orphan finding hope at the end of the line, Angstman astonishes us with complicated characters and crystal-clear prose. She is the literary heir to Shelby Foote, Willa Cather, and E. L. Doctorow. Get off the internet and read this book!”
—Ryan Ridge, author of NEW BAD NEWS, HUNTERS & GAMBLERS, AMERICAN HOMES, SECOND ACTS IN AMERICAN LIVES, WEIRD WEEKS, and OX
“Rudyard Kipling said, ‘If history were taught in the form of stories, it would never be forgotten.’ Nothing demonstrates the wisdom of that better than SHOOT THE HORSES FIRST by Leah Angstman. This is an immersive, expansive, and unforgettable collection of fictional histories. Drawn from various points in America’s past and clearly well researched, these stories are harrowing and hopeful by turns. All through, there are unexpected kindnesses and betrayals and acts of heroism and transformation. Characters so deeply wrought they seem to leap off the page. Soaring and vast and lyrical, this book is a must-read.”
—Kathy Fish, author of TOGETHER WE CAN BURY IT, RIFT, and WILD LIFE
“Angstman’s work is a joy to read. These characters see their worlds in the way that we see ours: naturally, and independent of the vastness of time in which life eventually situates itself in memory. Each one of these stories breathes troubling, beautiful life into the history that inspires it. The exhaustive research that must have gone into this collection lives in an easy harmony with the stories it undergirds, and it’s Angstman’s chief achievement here to strike that balance with poise and grace. Fear, love, heartache, and wonderment: it’s all right here, between both worlds.”
—Schuler Benson, author of THE POOR MAN’S GUIDE TO AN AFFORDABLE, PAINLESS SUICIDE
“SHOOT THE HORSES FIRST puts the ‘story’ in history. With scholarly rigor and the soul of a bard, Leah Angstman weaves tales of defiance and resilience that bring the past to life and show us what endures.”
—Jennifer Wortman, author of THIS. THIS. THIS. IS. LOVE. LOVE. LOVE.
Table of Contents:
Corner to Corner, End to End
The Orphan Train
Every time it snows
Casting Grand Titans
One night, when the breath of August Blew Hotter
In name only
Yellow Flowers
A lifetime of fishes
In the blood
New Mexico Farmhouse, Hard to find after all those years
Small sacrifices
The desert jewel
A cleaning to the stovepipe
The light ages; or holes in the heart
Every step counts
Music knows no color
Personal Opinion:
I think the first thing I noticed is that there is no short story titled Shoot the Horses First in this collection, which does make me wonder about the origin of the title. Second of all, this is a collection of a variety of American historical fiction short stories, everything from 1600s to 1900s which means that it doesn't focus on a single period piece. All the short stories are really good and I hope a lot of them will be turned to novels which I hope to read and review. There is also a strange symmetry to some of the stories, or rather different endings. The author is a meticulous researcher as well as a writer and definitely brings to life the many imperfections and tales of history gone by that are lost. So yes this may not focus on major American history events, but it does focus on the branches that aren't explored. So perhaps the title is a reference of peeling back the outside to see the inside?
This was given for review
4 out of 5
(0: Stay away unless a masochist 1: Good for insomnia 2: Horrible but readable; 3: Readable and quickly forgettable, 4: Good, enjoyable 5: Buy it, keep it and never let it go.)
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