Blood to Rubies

Praise for BLOOD TO RUBIES 

“Blood to Rubies, Deborah Hufford’s meticulously researched and exquisitely imagined debut epic of the forces that shaped and misshaped the Oregon Territory, is nothing short of phenomenal. Her narrative is a rich quilting of lives, Native and White, whose cultures met and clashed in the early days of the West. It is poetic and sensual and tragic and utterly riveting. Mark my words, Blood to Rubies is destined to be a classic.”   – WILLIAM KENT KRUEGER, New York Times Bestselling Author of This Tender Land and 25 other novels.

 “A scorching saga told with crushing intimacy and rock-ribbed characters...layered between love and war. Unforgettable.” – KATHLEEN GRISSOM, New York Times Bestselling Author of The Kitchen House and Crow Mary

 “The world needs to know this powerful story of Chief Joseph and his struggle to save his people. ”  –- PETER BUFFETT, Oscar-Winning Composer of Dances with Wolves Fire Dance scene and 500 Nations; New York Times Bestselling Author

“A spellbinding debut–both gritty and lush–impossible to put down.”   – LESLEY KAGEN, New York Times Bestselling Author of Every Now and Then and nine other novels

“Fluent and raw! Hufford takes you below the surface of an old west story and tramps you through our nation’s youth with all its vicious tendencies and human fallibilities laid bare in graceful, poignant, and blindingly honest language. Deborah Hufford is an author to watch! ”   – DIANNA ROSTAD, USA Today Bestselling Author of You Belong Here Now

“Deborah Hufford’s brilliant debut novel presents a lyrical, sweeping tale of cultures destined to collide, made personal and very, very human through characters who embody dignity, hope, aspiration and the heartbreak of deep loss.  Blood to Rubies will raise a reader’s heart, break it, then raise it again with an artist’s subtle touch.  This book is memorable, its characters vibrant, and its message as current today as it was when this story unfolded.  It merits multiple readings, careful thought and a place on a library’s highest shelf. ”    – GREG FIELDS, Author of Through the Waters and the Wild, 2022 Winner, Independent Press Award for Literary Fiction

“Blood to Rubies brings the romance of the West to vivid life. Hufford’s timely and detailed rendering follows a dozen characters from their origins, in Nimiipuu villages or eastern cities, by way of ships and wagon trains, boxing rings and brothels, mines and photographer’s studios, to their part in this historic conflict. Fascinating photographs add depth and resonance to this broadly woven tale. ”   - KAREN FISHER, Author of A Sudden Country, PEN-Faulkner Award Finalist and Fishtrap Writing the West Instructor 

“Blood to Rubies is spectacularly reminiscent of Dances with Wolves in its powerful depictions of the land and Native Americans’ sacred relationship to Nature. It breaks your heart. We are inspired to understand why the earth is so precious to Native Americans and why it should be to us all.”   – GARY KELLER, Location Scout for Oscar-Winning Dances with Wolves and Kevin Costner's Emmy Award-Winning 500 Nations and Founding South Dakota Film Commissioner 

“Blood to Rubies takes you on Chief Joseph’s epic journey through the most rugged terrain on the planet. The book is so real and so powerful, you feel as if you are riding with Joseph's band in 1877."   – SANDRA BRONCHEAU-McFARLAND, Chief Administrator of the Nez Perce National Trail and Nez Perce Tribal Member

“As a Nez Perce elder who has been on the Chief Joseph Annual Trail Ride nearly thirty times, retracing the exodus of Joseph and our people, I can attest to the crucial importance of that historic event in Nez Perce culture. Our youth ride this trail as a tribal rite of passage. Blood to Rubies does justice to this saga and to the bravery of our people."     – BONNIE EWING, Nez Perce Elder, Founding Board Member of Chief Joseph Foundation, Mentor to Tribal Youth, and Descendant of the Nez Perce Chief Twisted Hair who saved Lewis and Clark from starvation and freezing to death in the Bitterroot Mountains in 1805

“Deborah Hufford’s Blood to Rubies is a beautifully rendered, sensual adventure of the struggle of Westerners moving to tame the Oregon Territory. This immersive story is richly evocative of a post-Civil War time frequently misrepresented in American Western movies, including the lives of indigenous peoples. Painted on a sweeping canvas of unspoiled plains, forests, and mountains, we are immersed in the grand and the grotesque, the lilting and the lascivious, the honest and the raw.”  –MICHAEL MILLER, Ph.D., Author of High Bridge, the story of Matilda Joslyn Gage, suffragist inducted into the Wolf Clan of the Mohawk

“Blood to Rubies is a panoramic portrayal of humanity's endless effort to better one's station in life and the tragic price paid by those whose destiny it is to lose everything in the struggle. Beautifully written, it is an important epic that should forever be included in the telling of our nation's history.”   –J. STANION, Author of My Place Among Them, the story of John Iron Horse, twelve-year-old survivor of the 1890 Wounded Knee Massacre, who is subjected to an Indian boarding school but finds there a sympathetic teacher 

“The story of Chief Joseph comes alive as blood and bone in this sweeping American saga of frontier carnage and courage. I could not stop reading as the story unfolded page by gripping page.” –LYNN SELDON, Author of Carolina's Ring and Virginia's Ring, the first two books of his war fiction trilogy