Armstrong (The Custer of the West)
by H.W. Crocker III
Regnery Fiction: Washington, D.C.
August 14, 2018
Hardcover: 256 pages, $18.29

As bombastic as Michael Scott and as ditzy as Bertie Wooster, George Armstrong Custer might be the most lovable buffoon in American history.  H.W. Crocker III writes for sons, fathers, and patriots alike in the tale of Armstrong, the first book in the "Custer of the West" series, available in hardcover and audio.

Fair warning: This is a book without trigger warnings.  The history of the real Custer is not for the faint-of-heart social justice warrior.  Although Custer fought for the Union during the Civil War, many of his best friends at West Point were Southerners – he even attended a Confederate officer's wedding as the war waged on.  Crocker's Armstrong is not at all different.  That statues of his Confederate foes and friends should be desecrated and toppled would be sacrilegious to him.  

The meek may inherit the earth, but they'll need to toughen up before they dive into this read.  What would Custer's life be like had he survived Little Big Horn?  Crocker happily tells us the tale.

After Colonel Custer escapes from his Sioux captors, he makes his manly way to the town of Bloody Gulch, adopting the nom de guerre "Armstrong."  Spirited, strong, and born to ride, he embarks on the adventure of a lifetime, freeing the citizens of Bloody Gulch from the clutches of an evil corporation.  His lion heart proudly rises to meet the ills of corruption, slavery, and murder, always animated by patriotism and duty.  While finding hidden treasure and unlikely friends, Armstrong wins the hearts of dancing girls, Indian scouts, and readers along the way, triumphing as only an unvanquished and passionate hero can.

Action-packed and great for laughs, Crocker's work is nevertheless anchored by a serious conservative worldview.  Despite his buffoonery, Armstrong commands respect, for he is alive to duty, honor, and the good.  He rightfully dreams of heroism and is ready to risk everything for what's right.  Though his character sometimes seems more foolhardy than wholesome – he drinks milk , follows his "inner cowboy," and requests the aid of Chinese acrobats with a call of "helpy-helpy fighty-fight chop-chop" – no one can deny that he embodies and lives out masculine virtues, so often forgotten in our time.  When his sidekick, Beauregard Gillette, toasts to their chivalric mission, he says, "May God have mercy on us all!"  "Hear, hear!" Armstrong replies.  Internally, he adds, "And I hoped He did."  He's a silly but God-fearing man, never so proud that he can't see what's above him.

Crocker dedicates the book to his wife Sally, his "own Libbie Custer."  The novel is written in epistolary style, with letters addressed to Armstrong's wife, Libbie.  Though Armstrong's convinced that each woman he meets is desperately in love with him, swooning over his "manly form," his fidelity to Libbie is unshakeable.  He enjoys the attention from the women he saves – the looks from "bottomless blue eyes," the "undisguised joy at being under my protection," the "girlish, giggling enjoyment" – but there's no trace of a rascal's promiscuity in his heart.  He loves and deeply misses his wife, to whom he's made an eternal and unforgettable vow of loyalty.  At a moment of uncommon weariness, he writes his wife to say he "sighed, took a swig of sarsaparilla, and as always, my dear, thought of you."  In fact, the real Custer had to win his Libbie, who was born in a superior social class, by taking a vow of temperance.  These wistful swigs of sarsaparilla may be written more in truth than fiction.

Fathers will love reading this book with their sons.  Patriots will love it, too.  Crocker reawakens the good old American pride that once animated stories of the Wild West that inspired kids to sing Davy Crockett, wear coonskin caps, and watch John Wayne movies.  All these things may be considered "politically incorrect" today, as Armstrong's bravery, duty, devotion, and love for all his countrymen may be, as well.  But that serves only to make Crocker's writing all the more irresistible in our truth-starved culture.  Prepare to delight in American history and heroism, unencumbered by trigger warnings and undimmed by the social justice warriors who abhor so much of what we ought to love about our country and our men.

Anne Mulrooney works at Regnery Publishing, where H.W. Crocker III is vice president and executive editor.