A nice combination of Canadian history, romantic biography, and literary research, the book is not only a good read but includes a bibliography, index and other material. Actually it is a roaring good adventure yarn about a highly eccentric dreamer and author of gothic novels. A major entry this year.
John Richardson was born in Newark (now Niagara on the Lake) Upper Canada in 1796, grew up in Amherstburg, fought as a boy soldier in the War of 1812, and, captured at the Battle of the Thames, was imprisoned in Kentucky. He served in Barbados and Grenada with the British Army, then returned in 1818 to work as journalist in London and Paris, where he wrote the two first Canadian novels, ECARTE and FRASCATI'S. His novel about Pontiac's siege on Fort Detroit, WACOUSTA, became an international best seller and established him as the best delineator of the American Indian in fiction. He fought in the Curliest Wars and returned to Canada to publish newspapers and get involved in politics. He died in New York city of starvation in 1852.