'Tho I Be Mute by Heather Miller - #extract #excerpt #blogtour

 

I know that we are always told not to judge a book by its cover, but how gorgeous are the colours on this?

It has made me all the more excited to be bringing you an excerpt of this lovely looking book, 'Tho I Be Mute by author Heather Miller.

As always, a little about the book first...

The Blurb

Clarinda faces a moment of profound reality—a rattlesnake bite, a harbinger of her imminent mortality—and undertakes an introspective journey. In her final days, she immortalizes not only her own story but that of her parents—a narrative steeped in her family’s insights into Cherokee heritage during the tumultuous years preceding the forced removal of Native communities.

In 1818, Clarinda’s father, Cherokee John Ridge, embarks on a quest for a young man’s education at the Foreign Mission School in Cornwall, Connecticut. Amidst sickness, he finds solace and love with Sarah, the steward’s quiet daughter. Despite enduring two years of separation, defamatory editorials, and societal upheaval due to their interracial love affair, the resilient couple weds in 1824. This marks the inception of a journey for Sarah as she delves into a world both cherished and feared—Cherokee Territory. As John Ridge advocates for the preservation of his people’s land and that of his Muskogee Creek neighbors against encroaching Georgia settlers and unscrupulous governmental officials, the stakes are high. His success or failure hinges on his ability to balance his proud Cherokee convictions with an intricate understanding of American law. Justice remains uncertain.

Grounded in a true story, ‘Tho I Be Mute resonates with a compelling historical narrative, giving an intimate voice to those heard, those ignored, those speechless, urging readers to not only hear but to truly listen.

The Excerpt

From Chapter 2: All That I Have Ever Had Is Yours, John Ridge

Long days later, we approached Cornwall, Connecticut from the south, where the Housatonic flowed over rolling hills similar to my homeland. From my view behind coach windows, stables and sawmills introduced the villages’ logging trade. Sheep grazed in the valleys under Colt’s Foot Mountain, supplying the wool mill with raw materials. In this valley, hamlets of family farms surrounded First Church. Wooden fence posts and rails divided tiny Cornwall into squared lots, while at home, our land overlapped, providing for an entire people.

The carriage stopped in front of the Academy of the Foreign Mission sitting among the bare cedar trees and hemlocks during this blustery fall of November 1818. The school building was a gambrel-roofed, two-story structure with a chimney on one end and a weathervane on the other, acting as bookends. Next to our classroom, a winter garden grew purple-leafed kale and hearty cabbage. A bare maple stood alone in the yard. With it, I sympathized, naked and separated, under constant surveillance. Unimpressive in appearance, this academy was where I hoped to gain insight into history and English, more advanced than my former schools at Spring Place and Brainerd Mission. It was an honor to be sent here, but at that moment, it lacked imagination’s climax.

Reminiscent of the original ‘city on the hill,’ the Foreign Mission School was primarily for religious instruction, training future missionaries who intended to convert the ‘savages’ to Christianity. I understood the whites’ faith; the Great Spirit has many names. Therefore, I would be contrite, but conversion was not my intention. I did not plan to become a missionary. Father insisted I become a lawyer, a politician. The Great Spirit was more equipped than I to guide the Cherokee to salvation.

As Doctor Dempsey opened and stepped from the carriage and interrupted my observations with reminders of my father’s expectations and guidelines for my behavior. To say these reminders were absent from my attention would imply his words were irrelevant. Still, Dempsey’s lecture was unnecessary. Concluding his ‘Sermon from the Coach,’ Dempsey waved his hand and said, “We are here, John. Let us make our introductions.” We crossed the worn path, with Dempsey leading, and I following behind, as my limp slowed my gait.

Upon entering, smells of recent peat fires and old books struck me. Sheer numbers of texts bordered the log walls of the schoolroom. The spines on the shelves wrapped around rough-crafted tables and straight-backed chairs set for study and meals. A small fire burned in the hearth, while candles lit this day of clouds. As we entered, the students’ backs, grouped in pairs, hovered over books of prayer. They took turns reading to one another various verses in English, absent any context, and translated them into the languages of their homelands. Missionary school indeed. The Biblical stories whites esteemed taught me many things, including what they thought it meant to be a man. Although I would never be Sampson or King David, my name was John, Skahtlelohskee, the mockingbird. 

About the Author:

History is better than fiction.We all leave a legacy.

As an English educator, Heather Miller has spent twenty-four years teaching her students the author’s craft. Now, she’s writing it herself, hearing voices from the past. Heather earned her MFA in creative writing in 2022 and is teaching high school as well as college composition courses. 

Miller’s foundation began in the theatre, through performance storytelling. She can tap dance, stage-slap someone, and sing every note from Les Miserables. But by far, her favorite role has been as a fireman’s wife and mom to three: a trumpet player, a future civil engineer, and a RN. Alas, there’s only one English major in her house.

Heather continues writing the Ridge Family Saga. Her current work-in-progress, Stands, concludes the Ridge Family Saga. 

(all materials courtesy of The Coffee Pot Book Club)

(all opinions are my own)

Yellow Bird's Song by Heather Miller - #excerpt #blogtour

 

Today I am thrilled to be bringing you an excerpt from Yellow Bird's Song by author, Heather Miller. But first, a little about the book...

The Blurb

Rollin Ridge, a mercurial figure in this tribal tale, makes a fateful decision in 1850, leaving his family behind to escape the gallows after avenging his father and grandfather’s brutal assassinations. With sin and grief packed in his saddlebags, he and his brothers head west in pursuit of California gold, embarking on a journey marked by hardship and revelation. Through letters sent home, Rollin uncovers the unrelenting legacy of his father’s sins, an emotional odyssey that delves deep into his Cherokee history.

The narrative’s frame transports readers to the years 1827-1835, where Rollin’s parents, Cherokee John Ridge and his white wife, Sarah, stumble upon a web of illicit slave running, horse theft, and whiskey dealings across Cherokee territory. Driven by a desire to end these inhumane crimes and defy the powerful pressures of Georgia and President Andrew Jackson, John Ridge takes a bold step by running for the position of Principal Chief, challenging the incumbent, Chief John Ross. The Ridges face a heart-wrenching decision: to stand against discrimination, resist the forces of land greed, and remain on their people’s ancestral land, or to sign a treaty that would uproot an entire nation, along with their family.

***

ISBN:  978 1962465229

Publisher:  Historium Press

Formats:  e-book, hardback and paperback

No. of Pages:  370 (paperback)

***

The Excerpt

John Rollin Ridge, West Dessert, Utah, 1851

Instead of other travelers along this desert route, we’d found wagon carcasses, adding ours to the lot. Whether human corpses decayed inside, I couldn’t say. I didn’t stop to find out, ridding myself of guilt for not burying the dead. My body couldn’t have done it properly with so little water, not without following directly behind them. 

As the afternoon waned, we dismounted and walked beside our thirsty animals. In the desert, a man’s horse becomes too weak to carry him. So, he travels on foot, closer to the dust, breathing and clogging his mind with villainous grains. Packs double their weight with worry, heavier with one last blanket of self-preservation. Yet, parched though he may be, his mind sings songs, like uprooted choruses from a withered elder, telling his trials to impatient warriors who already know the legend’s end.

Expanses of grass shrunk into patches, peeking through worn spots in the desert, like leg hair peeking through worn and holey farmhand pants. We found the pooled water brackish, the color of tea from iodine, salt mixing with sparse rainwater. It wasn’t potable for man or beast. With each disappointment from the lack of soluble water, our progress trickled, nearly stopping entirely. 

The sway of horses and pack mules found their rhythm, sluggish though it was. Heat rippled across the sand to just repel back to us from wide mountain berths. Thorny bushes turned pale, a shade lighter than the sand at our feet, desperate for water deep in their roots. Snakes could not reach it and fled, finding no shade. 

We pressed forward into the sun, past the mountains near Salt Lake. Each pull at the rim of our hats remained where it was stretched. Bandanas covered our mouths, eyes asquint, leaving each of us absent identity. 

Aeneas coughed, attempting to break his silence, rallying saliva enough to articulate some question or another. One which I’d likely have no answer to. He said, “How are we gonna feed the horses, Rollin?” 

I was right. 

Wacooli answered behind me. “Anee, we’ll have to search for grass on foot and bring it to ‘em.”  

From my brother’s response to Wacooli’s lack of enthusiasm, I knew Aeneas stewed in his thoughts. His concern for our animals was more about him than the beasts. 

Aeneas said, “You know what I’m hungry for? Grandma’s fried bread, Mama’s glazed chicken, Honey’s pole beans boiled with fatback, and strawberry pie.”

“Damn it, Aeneas! Doesn’t do us any good thinking about it.” I took the fatal risk of putting my thoughts to voice while lingering in Aeneas’ conjured savory tastes. I bit my tongue and swallowed twice. “Aeneas, do you remember Papa asking Mama to take all the seeds out of his strawberries?”

“Nope. Too little. You can hold Papa in your thoughts better than me, Rollin. You’ve got more stock.” 

When I didn’t answer right away, he asked, “What did Papa say?”

“Said they got stuck in his teeth, and she needed to remove them.”

“Did she throw something at him?” Aeneas smiled briefly and tried a laugh, but his throat was too dry to form the sound. 

“No. She kissed him, as I remember it.” 

The memory was as sweet as the fruit. Our lives were so predictable then, freedom through synchronicity. Running Waters will always be home, not the cabin in the West at Honey Creek, or Mama’s dogtrot in Fayetteville, but our home, Running Waters, in Cherokee Nation East, settled among valley lands in the foothills of the Appalachians. 

My parent’s extensive farm stretched into the valley on a high hill, crowned with a fine grove of oak and hickory, with a large clear spring at its foot. The orchard was on the left, wheat and cornfields to the right, pastures of cows, goats on one side near the house, and sheep grazing on the other.3 Behind the house, the running spring gave our home its name. After Grandfather’s New Echota Treaty in 1835, we, too, would run over rock, slip on moss, and fall downhill with only brief plains to pool. 

The ground whitened under our horse hooves, salted sand gathering in random odd-shaped lines. Only God could articulate their rhyme and reason. Boot tracks marked our path northwest. Each saunter brought another thought: some forward, most backward. Where we’d been, what we’d lost. My thoughts rambled without any respite.

***

About the Author:

As a veteran English teacher and college professor, Heather has spent nearly thirty years teaching her students the author’s craft. Now, with empty nest time on her hands, she’s writing herself, transcribing lost voices in American’s history.

(all media courtesy of The Coffee Pot Book Club)

(all opinions are my own)