Utley's The Indian Frontier of the American West presents a brief overview of America's clash with the frontier indian culture over a fifty year period. What is a fascinating story unfortunately disappoints in Mr. Utley's hands.

The information relating to scores of major tribes during several decades of relationship with the US involves a large cast. This book presents the briefest of sketches relating to conflicts, treaty negotiations and battles. Characters pop into the book and disappear just as quickly. The middle of the book provides a chronological accounting of the two decades after the Civil War, and that is where it has its difficulty. Perhaps this is just too thin a book to cover such a broad expanse. What is presented in this middle is a recitation of vignettes, persons and events, none presented in enough detail to grip the reader or provide any meaningful flavor to this narrative.

The author has more luck in his chapters that are not chronological. They book-end the story. A brief on how American indian policy arrived to mid century (1800's) and two at the end on the Indian reform movement and the closing of the frontier are much more tightly written and interesting.

I think the author just tried to accomplish too much and ended up with a broad brush stroke of what should be a fascinating story. The material reads like a school text book, facts are presented rather than a story told. This makes for dry reading at times.

Overall, this is a passable book for anyone wanting to get an overview of Plains Indian history. For those wanting a fascinating story, they may want to check out Connell's Son of the Morning Star.

This book is written largely from the perspective of the Indians of the American West but Utley does a good job of including insight into why the white man acted the way they did. His conclusion at the end of the book is "Given who these people were (the whites), what they knew, and what they believed, it is difficult to see how they might have behaved differently enough to have brought about a result that would be acceptable today". What struck me throughout the book was how often agreements that were made with the indians were ignored, violated, and broken. The book is well written and easy to read. If you want a good overview of the American West from 1846-1890, this is a must read.