At the age of twelve, an orphan named Will Cooper is given a horse, a key, and a map and is sent on a journey through the uncharted wilderness of the Cherokee Nation. Will is a bound boy, obliged to run a remote Indian trading post. As he fulfills his lonesome duty, Will finds a father in Bear, a Cherokee chief, and is adopted by him and his people, developing relationships that ultimately forge Will’s character. All the while, his love of Claire, the enigmatic and captivating charge of volatile and powerful Featherstone, will forever rule Will’s heart. In a voice filled with both humor and yearning, Will tells of a lifelong search for home, the hunger for fortune and adventure, the rebuilding of a trampled culture, and above all an enduring pursuit of passion.

Named ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR by
Los Angeles Times Book Review, Chicago Tribune,
and St. Louis Post-Dispatch

“A literary journey of magnitude . . . Thirteen Moons belongs to the ages.”
–Los Angeles Times

“A boisterous, confident novel that draws from the epic tradition: It tips its hat to Don Quixote as well as Twain and Melville, and it boldly sets out to capture a broad swatch of America’s story in the mid-nineteenth century.”
–The Boston Globe

“Frazier works on an epic scale, but his genius is in the details–he has a scholar’s command of the physical realities of early America and a novelist’s gift for bringing them to life.”
–Time

“A powerhouse second act . . . a brilliant success.”
–The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

“Compulsively readable . . . a fitting successor to Cold Mountain.”
–St. Louis Post-Dispatch

“Magical . . . fascinating and moving . . . You will find much to admire and savor in Thirteen Moons.”
–USA Today

“Genius.”
–Time

“Mesmerizing . . . a bountiful literary panorama . . . The history that Frazier hauntingly unwinds through Will is as melodic as it is melancholy, but the sublime love story is the narrative’s true heart.”
–Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Brimming with vivid, adventurous incident.”
–Raleigh News & Observer

“Reading a Frazier novel is like listening to a fine symphony. . . . Take the time to savor Frazier’s work, to take in each thought, to relish the turn of phrase or the imagery of a craftsman.”
–The Denver Post

“[Four stars] . . . Commanding . . . Frazier’s faithful will not be disappointed.”
–People

“Superbly entertaining.”
–Richmond Times-Dispatch

“Fascinating . . . vivid and alive.”
–Newsweek ...

This magnificent novel by one of America’s finest writers is the epic of one man’s remarkable journey, set in nineteenth-century America against the background of a vanishing people and a rich way of life.

At the age of twelve, under the Wind moon, Will is given a horse, a key, and a map, and sent alone into the Indian Nation to run a trading post as a bound boy. It is during this time that he grows into a man, learning, as he does, of the raw power it takes to create a life, to find a home. In a card game with a white Indian named Featherstone, Will wins – for a brief moment – a mysterious girl named Claire, and his passion and desire for her spans this novel. As Will’s destiny intertwines with the fate of the Cherokee Indians – including a Cherokee Chief named Bear – he learns how to fight and survive in the face of both nature and men, and eventually, under the Corn Tassel Moon, Will begins the fight against Washington City to preserve the Cherokee’s homeland and culture. And he will come to know the truth behind his belief that “only desire trumps time.”

Brilliantly imagined, written with great power and beauty by a master of American fiction, Thirteen Moons is a stunning novel about a man’s passion for a woman, and how loss, longing and love can shape a man’s destiny over the many moons of a life....