The Life and Adventures of Joaquin Murieta, the Celebrated California Bandit, is a unique book in many ways.
In 1854, it was the first novel published in California, and it is also the first novel written by a Native American.
Yellow Bird was the son and grandson of famous Cherokee chiefs, and he lived a vigorous and dangerous life as an Indian.
But he was also a well-educated and literate man, known in the white man's world as John Rollin Ridge.
Both a novelist and poet, Yellow Bird made his living in California as a newspaperman, ending his short life in Grass Valley as the editor of the Grass Valley National newspaper, of which he was a part owner.
He was just forty when he died, but he had lived a fuller life than most.
The Life and Adventures of Joaquin Murieta was Yellow Bird's only novel, but it left an enduring mark.
It not only sparked a number of knockoffs but also created the enduring myth of Joaquin Murieta.
In addition, it was the genesis of the dime novel industry of the late nineteenth-century that persists even today as the paperback Westerns found in every bookstore, newsstand, and even supermarket.
It was truly a first in that regard.
But it is worth reading for more than those reasons -- it is a colorful and romantic story that fires the imagination of the reader, portraying in no uncertain terms what life was like in those times.
Poitin Press Joaquin murieta, paperback/john rollin aka yellow bird ridge
