Review by Booklist Review
*Starred Review* Roberts expands and updates his In Search of the Old Ones (1996), which has become a minor cult classic among amateur archaeologists exploring the prehistoric ruins of Utah, New Mexico, Arizona, and southwest Colorado. In recounting his treks over the past 20 years, Roberts addresses debates both academic, such as whether the Fremont culture of Pueblo Indians in central Utah should be included with Anasazi communities further south, and moral, such as whether discovered objects, including baskets and pottery shards, should be left in place or removed and incorporated into museum collections. In the company of fellow adventurers, archaeologists, and native guides, Roberts explores Range Creek, a tributary of Utah's Green River, and finds granaries left by the ancient Fremont Puebloans; Fortress Rock, near Canyon de Chelly, where a band of Navajos hid for four and a half years to escape the Long Walk to Bosque Redondo in 1863; and the little-explored, nearly inaccessible Kaiparowits Plateau, now part of the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in southern Utah. Roberts' captivating retelling of these and other exploits in search of the Southwest's ancient history has the pull and excitement of a suspense novel and appeals to a wide range of readers interested in this region's deep past and great beauty.--Donovan, Deborah Copyright 2015 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
This rather puzzling book, a sequel of sorts to In Search of the Old Ones (1996), is a detailed guide to the archaeology of the American Southwest, particularly the areas inhabited by the Anasazi, or (in what Roberts terms "p.c." parlance) "Ancestral Puebloans." Roberts, a mountaineer and amateur archaeologist, received both praise and criticism for his earlier work, notably for the amount of attention it drew from visitors to Utah's Cedar Mesa site. In this followup, Roberts states that his goal is to offer readers an account of the most exciting and revealing research that has been produced about the region in the past 20 years-but instead he includes only long-winded anecdotes about his fellow climbers, archaeologists, and colorful local characters. The book is awkwardly situated among the genres of travelogue, adventure story, and scholarly monograph; it is insufficiently dramatic to satisfy on the first two counts, and the lack of footnotes undermines its success on the third. Puzzlingly, the book's illustrations include neither maps nor photos of artifacts, such as the Telluride blanket, to whose discovery and interpretation Roberts devotes an entire chapter. Roberts's love for the Southwest and its precolonial cultures emerges clearly, but his execution in producing this book is far less successful. (May) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Review by Library Journal Review
Roberts (In Search of the Old Ones) returns to the American Southwest, bringing his experiences as a climber, traveler, and writer to the history of the Pueblo and Navajo peoples. Readers will follow the author into canyon country, hiking through pinyon-juniper stretches and scaling hidden alcoves. The text discusses important issues in anthropology, including archaeological preservation, the relationships of the natives to the historical landscape, and the complicated tensions between archaeologists and natives. Serious students of history and archaeology may glaze over the episodic adventurism, but the work succeeds in popularizing the often overly technical or inaccessible archaeological literature. Readers who are more interested in history than hiking may prefer Stephen Lekson's History of the Ancient Southwest. Nevertheless, Roberts has done his homework, and the book serves as an excellent literature review of Southwestern archaeology. In addition to examining common questions (e.g., Where did the Four Corners people go after the 13th century?), Roberts delves into less-charted territory, lending time to the Fremont culture and the Navajo leader Hoskinini. VERDICT Part history, part memoir, part excursion, this work is a great companion for scholar-adventurers.-Jeffrey Meyer, Mt. Pleasant P.L., IA © Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
More travels in the Southwest of yore by outdoorsman/writer Roberts (Alone on the Ice: The Greatest Survival Story in the History of Exploration, 2013, etc.).There's a place in southern Utah, not far from the Grand Canyon and closer still to the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument and Canyonlands, where, before 2002, the author had never beenunusual, since he's scrambled up and down most of the rugged terrain in the Four Corners states over the last four decades or so. Interestingly, most of his "desert-rat cronies" hadn't been there, either. More interestingly still, as he chronicles here, neither had many ancient people, save for a few outlier Kayenta Anasazi from down south who eventually "gave up on Kaiparowits[and] returned to their homeland." Roberts, a keen student of the region's anthropology, takes time to wonder why, noting that in the last 15 years, interest has grown, with ever more sophistication in our understanding of the many ethnic and cultural groups that contributed to regional prehistory and their far-flung network of connections. Roberts also traveled nearby to the hidden lattice of canyons where vast numbers of Fremont Culture remains were recently formally cataloged, having been "protected by a single private owner" instead of the complex of laws surrounding what are called "cultural resources." The author journeyed to places that have been overrun and ransacked by private collectors and protected, if sometimes too late, by the long arm of federal authority. Throughout, Roberts does two things: He stands on the land himself, affording armchair travelers a fine view of the place, and he scours vast stacks of scholarly literature to give us an up-to-date take on the minefield that is historical interpretation, with scholars coming just short of blows over angels-on-pinheads sorts of questions. Credit the author for including plenty of interesting photos, as well. For fans of all things Southwesternnot quite as robust and thoughtful as Craig Childs' House of Rain (2007) but a pleasure to read. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
