 First edition | |
| Author | Paulette Jiles |
|---|---|
| Audio read by | Grover Gardner |
| Country | United States |
| Genre | Western |
| Set in | Texas, Old West |
| Publisher | William Morrow |
Publication date | 2016 |
| Pages | 212 |
| ISBN | 978-0-06-240921-8 |
| LC Class | PR9199.3.J54 |
| Preceded by | Lighthouse Island |
| Followed by | Simon the Fiddler |
| Website | http://www.newsoftheworldbook.com/ |
News of the World is a 2016 American Western novel by Paulette Jiles.
The book opens in 1870 on the wild border between Texas and Indian Territory, where a 10-year-old girl has been released after four years of captivity. Kiowa raiders had killed her family and taken her hostage, eventually raising her as one of their own with the Kiowa name Cicada. The girl is entrusted to freedman Britt Johnson, who then hands her over to his acquaintance, 71-year-old Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd, a veteran of the War of 1812 and the Mexican-American War. Kidd agrees to take the girl to Castroville, Texas, where her aunt and uncle live. Captain Kidd makes his living as a news reader, traveling between towns and charging a dime per person to read aloud from newspapers. His profession pays little, and Kidd is also struggling with family problems: his daughters are still living in war-torn Georgia, and he has yet to reclaim land in Texas that once belonged to his late wife, the daughter of Spanish landowners.
Captain Kidd purchases an old traveling wagon and sets off with the girl. At first, he finds himself at a loss as to how to deal with the girl's semi-wild state. She considers herself to be Kiowa, and views her ordeal as a second kidnapping, refusing to cooperate with the Captain and even nearly getting herself killed when she runs away and provokes a band of wandering Native Americans. She speaks no English, and one of Capt. Kidd's early triumphs in their relationship is merely learning her original name: Johanna. As they journey south, the Captain continues to read the news when they reach new towns, earning enough to sustain their forward progress. He is careful to avoid local stories, particularly about the rivalry between the political factions headed by Edmund J. Davis and Andrew Jackson Hamilton because he knows it will provoke arguments in his audience. Likewise, he is also careful on the road, taking great pains not to call attention to himself or Johanna.
In Dallas, Captain Kidd is approached after his reading by a man named Almay, who had been following Kidd and Johanna for some time. Almay is accompanied by two Caddo men, and he offers to buy Johanna. Correctly guessing that Almay intends to sell Johanna as a prostitute, Capt. Kidd sets up a meeting for the next morning, and then flees during the night with Johanna. Almay and his Caddo henchmen eventually catch up with the Captain and Johanna, and ambush them on the road. The Captain, with Johanna's help, is able to wound the Caddo men, and kill Almay, by loading his shotgun with shells packed with dimes from his last reading.
Continuing on, Captain Kidd encounters a band of pro-Hamilton militants manning a checkpoint near a ferry crossing. One of them, a young man named John Calley, extorts money from the Captain to let him pass, only to return it later when his reading is canceled following a fistfight between Davis and Hamilton men. The Captain and Johanna leave that night, only to run into more trouble in the next town when a gang of drunken hoods, the Horrell brothers, threaten Captain Kidd and insist that he praise them at his next reading. Kidd leaves town without doing a reading, and he and Johanna are forced to hide when Kiowa warriors stumble across their hiding place. To Kidd's relief, Johanna chooses not to alert them, and the warriors depart.
After putting together a reading in Fredericksburg to raise enough money for them to finish the trip, the Captain delivers Johanna to her relatives. At a party to celebrate her return, a local man warns him not to leave Johanna, claiming that her aunt and uncle are abusive and greedy. Captain Kidd returns to his home in San Antonio, but eventually decides to return and check on Johanna. After realizing that her relatives are treating her like a slave, he takes her with him and formally adopts her into his family. His daughters eventually move to San Antonio, and reclaim their right to their ancestral land and mansion. The Captain settles into retirement as a printer and writer while Johanna grows into a mature young woman, albeit never completely shedding her Kiowa ways. John Calley visits, and upon earning enough money as a cattleman, asks for and receives Johanna's hand in marriage, with the Captain giving her his prized gold watch as a reminder of the bond forged between them.
Jiles wrote that much of her account of Johanna's alienation is based on Scott Zesch's The Captured. [1] The character of Captain Kidd is drawn from a friend's distant relation, Captain Adolphus Caesar Kydd. [2] Kidd made his first appearance in Jiles' 2010 novel The Color of Lightning. Jiles has spun off one of the characters from News of the World in her forthcoming novel Simon the Fiddler. [3]
The story also has some similarities to those of Cynthia Ann Parker and Matilda Lockhart.
Fox 2000 Pictures was reported to be in a "bidding battle" over the rights to News of the World, which it acquired in 2017. [4] After the acquisition of Fox by Disney, the film was moved to Universal Pictures. It stars Tom Hanks as Captain Kidd and Helena Zengel as Johanna. The screenplay was rewritten by the film's director Paul Greengrass after an original version by Luke Davies. [5]
William Kidd, also known as Captain William Kidd or simply Captain Kidd, was a Scottish sea captain who was commissioned as a privateer and had experience as a pirate. He was tried and executed in London in 1701 for murder and piracy.
Fiddler on the Roof is a musical with music by Jerry Bock, lyrics by Sheldon Harnick, and book by Joseph Stein, set in the Pale of Settlement of Imperial Russia in or around 1905. It is based on Tevye and his Daughters and other tales by Sholem Aleichem. The story centers on Tevye, a milkman in the village of Anatevka, who attempts to maintain his Jewish religious and cultural traditions as outside influences encroach upon his family's lives. He must cope with the strong-willed actions of his three older daughters who wish to marry for love; their choices of husbands are successively less palatable for Tevye. An edict of the tsar eventually evicts the Jews from their village.
You've Got Mail is a 1998 American romantic comedy-drama film directed by Nora Ephron and starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. Inspired by the 1937 Hungarian play Parfumerie by Miklós László, it was co-written by Nora and Delia Ephron. It tells the story of two people in an online romance who are unaware they are also business rivals. It marked the third pairing of Hanks and Ryan, who previously appeared together in Joe Versus the Volcano (1990) and Sleepless in Seattle (1993), the latter directed by Ephron.
Kiowa people are a Native American tribe and an indigenous people of the Great Plains of the United States. They migrated southward from western Montana into the Rocky Mountains in Colorado in the 17th and 18th centuries, and eventually into the Southern Plains by the early 19th century. In 1867, the Kiowa were moved to a reservation in southwestern Oklahoma.
The Dagger of Kamui is a Japanese novel series by Tetsu Yano released by Kadokawa Shoten from 1984 to 1985.
Paulette Jiles is an American poet, memoirist, and novelist.
The American Indian Exposition, held annually during the first full week in August at the Caddo County Fairgrounds in Anadarko, Oklahoma, is one of the oldest and largest intertribal gatherings in the United States. Sponsored by fifteen tribes, representatives from up to fifty other tribes participate in any given year.
Citizen Vee is the codename of several superheroes appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics.
Adventure Galley, also known as Adventure, was an English sailing ship captained by William Kidd, the privateer. She was a type of hybrid ship that combined square rigged sails with oars to give her manoeuvrability in both windy and calm conditions. The vessel was launched at the end of 1695 and was acquired by Kidd the following year to serve in his privateering venture. Between April 1696 and April 1698, she travelled thousands of miles across the Atlantic and Indian Oceans in search of pirates but failed to find any until nearly the end of her travels. Instead, Kidd himself turned pirate in desperation at not having obtained any prizes. Adventure Galley succeeded in capturing two vessels off India and brought them back to Madagascar, but by the spring of 1698 the ship's hull had become so rotten and leaky that she was no longer seaworthy. She was stripped of anything movable and sunk off the north-eastern coast of Madagascar. Her remains have not yet been located.
Paul Greengrass is a British film director, film producer, screenwriter, and former journalist. He specialises in dramatisations of historic events and is known for his signature use of hand-held cameras.
The Unforgiven is a 1960 American Western film directed by John Huston and starring Burt Lancaster and Audrey Hepburn. Filmed in Durango, Mexico, the supporting cast features Audie Murphy, Charles Bickford, Lillian Gish, John Saxon, Joseph Wiseman, Doug McClure and Albert Salmi. The story is based upon the 1957 novel by Alan Le May, author of The Searchers. Uncommonly for its time, the film spotlights the issue of racism against Native Americans and people who were believed to have Native American blood in the Old West. The film is also known for its problems behind the scenes. Huston often said this was his least-satisfying movie.
Luke Davies is an Australian writer of poetry, novels and screenplays. His best known works are Candy: A Novel of Love and Addiction and the screenplay for the film Lion, which earned him a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. Davies also co-wrote the screenplay for the film News of the World.
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Admiral Sir Frederick Hew George Dalrymple-Hamilton KCB was a British naval officer who served in World War I and World War II. He was captain of HMS Rodney when it engaged the Bismarck on 27 May 1941.
War Arrow is a 1954 American Technicolor Western film directed by George Sherman and starring Maureen O'Hara, Jeff Chandler and John McIntire. Filmed by Universal Pictures and based on the Seminole Scouts, the film was shot in Agoura, California.
Captain Caution is a 1940 American adventure film directed by Richard Wallace set during the War of 1812. The film stars Victor Mature, Bruce Cabot and Alan Ladd. It was based on the novel of the same name by Kenneth Roberts. Elmer Raguse was nominated for an Academy Award for Sound Recording.
News of the World is a 2020 American Western film co-written and directed by Paul Greengrass, based on the 2016 novel of the same name by Paulette Jiles, and starring Tom Hanks and Helena Zengel. The film follows an aging Civil War veteran who must return a young girl who was taken in by the Kiowa, and raised as one of them, to her last remaining family. She has lost both her birth and Kiowa families.
Helena Zengel is a German actress. She is best known for her roles in the films System Crasher (2019) and News of the World (2020).
Abby Jimenez is an American romance novelist and founder of Nadia Cakes. She is the author of the books The Friend Zone (2019), The Happy Ever After Playlist (2020)