Books with author Philip McBride

The story of the Callahan Expedition has slept in a dusty corner of Texas Ranger history for over 160 years . Until now, until this novel—A Different Country Entirely.In 1855, across the southwest edge of Texas, settlers live in daily fear of the savage raids by Apache warriors. After their depredations, the Apaches outrun their pursuers to cross the Rio Grande River to the safe haven of Mexico, where the U.S. Army and the Texas Rangers are forbidden.In October, Captain James Callahan and 115 Rangers ignore the international border to follow the Apache band that killed the young son of a Methodist preacher. Forewarned of the Texan invaders, the Mexican army waits by the Rio Escondido.Undeterred, Callahan’s outnumbered mounted Rangers charge the Mexican cavalry, lances against Colt revolvers. After the bloody clash, pursuers become the prey.Hear the voices of Caroline, a ravaged woman taken by the Apaches; a runaway slave named Thompson; Texas Rangers McKean and Gunn; Mexican Colonel Menchaca; and Captain Callahan himself. Their tale is sometimes brutal, sometimes poignant, and compelling to the last word.

The Texans from Hood's Texas Brigade and other regiments who fought at Antietam on 16-17 September 1862 described their experiences of the battle in personal diaries, interviews, newspaper articles, letters, and speeches. Their reminiscences provide a fascinating and harrowing account of the battle as they fought the Army of the Potomac. This book collates their writings alongside speeches that were given in the decades after the battle, during the annual reunions of Hood's Brigade Association and the dedication of the Hood's Brigade Monument at the state capital in Austin, Texas. These accounts describe their actions at the East Woods, Dunker's Church and Miller's Cornfield, and other areas during the battle. For the first time ever, their experiences are compiled in Texans at Antietam: A Terrible Clash of Arms, 16-17 September 1862.

In this purpose-filled novel, being a kid in the late 1950's has its ups and downs. In fits and starts, from fourth grade until the seventh grade, ‘Birdbrain’ Danny McBain figures things out, fitting together life's puzzle pieces one after another. First, his family moves across town, plopping him into a new school with no friends. Soon Danny is facing a bully named Preston, looking for a way through without losing his dignity or getting beat up. When a new friend with brown skin is pushed aside, the puzzle piece of pervasive segregation confounds Danny. Fifth grade means little league and trading disks with a girl. After a pal’s lie saves the two of them when caught sharing answers on a test, the sly puzzle piece of deceit slips in. During Danny’s sixth grade, the power of television, the punch of a teacher’s paddle and the cruelty of public humiliation toss unexpected pieces into his growing jigsaw puzzle. In Junior High, friendships rise and fall while Danny faces social choices and the death of a classmate. Junior high summers bring family vacations and camp, leading to the discovery that his mother can be a mama-grizzly, and a rock on the bottom of a cold-water spring is the highest hurdle in Danny’s life. Camping and deer hunting with his grandparents round out this tale of a boy’s awakening.

In A Different Dragon Entirely, novelist McBride acknowledges his half-century love of dragon fantasy literature by writing a dragon novel. Being a life-long Texan, McBride pictured his dragon as Texas-centric.Suppose one little horny toad grew from four inches long to the size of a house, sported batwings, flew high in the sky, squirted acidic blood hundreds of yards, and ate buffalo. That aptly describes Leine, the main character in a dragon fantasy tale set on the Texas frontier in 1840. Leine is a unique giant flying Texas horny toad in a story that is vaguely inspired by British author Naomi Novik’s Temeraire Napoleonic dragon series.Real horny toads are native to western North American and are becoming ever more rare. McBride saw them occasionally as a boy, but his last encounter was twenty years ago in New Mexico. The subspecies of Texas horny toads enjoys the ability to spurt streams of stinky blood from their eyes. The squatty little lizards are just 3 to 4 inches long and are wide, almost oval shaped, yet they can squirt defensive coyote-deterring blood up to three feet. Looking closely at a Texas horny toad head-on, one sees an oddly appealing dragon face if ever there was one—a wide mouth, amber scales and a row of tall spikes over its round eyes.McBride, through the efforts of the book’s first character, created a huge dragon from a little horny toad. In addition to magically up-sizing the palm-sized lizard, Padre Renato, an old Scottish rake-turned-priest, surgically added bat wings and a couple of other enhancements providing a tinge of the Frankenstein-esque to Leine.Written for young adults, A Different Dragon Entirely has ongoing action with a cast of settlers, outlaws, and Indians. Leine herself, now house-size after living in solitude on the Texas frontier for 100 years, is confronted by Mally Gunn, a defiant 15-year-old farm girl. During a traumatic first encounter when the dragon eats the girl’s valuable appaloosa mare, the two begin their telepathic talk in Latin, aided by an ancient Druid-Christian gold necklace.In spite of their first meeting, somehow the resolute teenage girl and the dragon with a ravenous appetite forge a unique bond. Yet, uncertainty bedevils the friendship. Is Leine human behind her amber scales? Or, is her prickly personality the camouflage of a cunning demon, as Mally’s family suspects? When the brutal war between Texas’ Native Americans and white settlers touches Mally’s family, will the formidable dragon take sides?The action follows the historical 1840 great Comanche Raid in which 600 warriors rode from Central Texas to the Gulf of Mexico, burning towns and carrying out terrible depredations on the white population of early Texas. Historically, the raid ended in the Battle of Plum Creek. In McBride’s novel, Mally and Leine use wooden canteen bombs to stage a rescue aided by a whalebone corset in this dragon-fueled alternative history of the largest Indian raid in Texas history.Yet, for all its action set in the nascent Republic of Texas, A Different Dragon Entirely is in its core a girl-meets-dragon story

In this purpose-filled novel, being a kid in the late 1950's has its ups and downs. In fits and starts, from fourth grade until the seventh grade, ‘Birdbrain’ Danny McBain figures things out, fitting together life's puzzle pieces one after another. First, his family moves across town, plopping him into a new school with no friends. Soon Danny is facing a bully named Preston, looking for a way through without losing his dignity or getting beat up. When a new friend with brown skin is pushed aside, the puzzle piece of pervasive segregation confounds Danny. Fifth grade means little league and trading disks with a girl. After a pal’s lie saves the two of them when caught sharing answers on a test, the sly puzzle piece of deceit slips in. During Danny’s sixth grade, the power of television, the punch of a teacher’s paddle and the cruelty of public humiliation toss unexpected pieces into his growing jigsaw puzzle. In Junior High, friendships rise and fall while Danny faces social choices and the death of a classmate. Junior high summers bring family vacations and camp, leading to the discovery that his mother can be a mama-grizzly, and a rock on the bottom of a cold-water spring is the highest hurdle in Danny’s life. Camping and deer hunting with his grandparents round out this tale of a boy’s awakening.

The story of the Callahan Expedition has slept in a dusty corner of Texas Ranger history for over 160 years . Until now, until this novel—A Different Country Entirely.In 1855, across the southwest edge of Texas, settlers live in daily fear of the savage raids by Apache warriors. After their depredations, the Apaches outrun their pursuers to cross the Rio Grande River to the safe haven of Mexico, where the U.S. Army and the Texas Rangers are forbidden.In October, Captain James Callahan and 115 Rangers ignore the international border to follow the Apache band that killed the young son of a Methodist preacher. Forewarned of the Texan invaders, the Mexican army waits by the Rio Escondido.Undeterred, Callahan’s outnumbered mounted Rangers charge the Mexican cavalry, lances against Colt revolvers. After the bloody clash, pursuers become the prey.Hear the voices of Caroline, a ravaged woman taken by the Apaches; a runaway slave named Thompson; Texas Rangers McKean and Gunn; Mexican Colonel Menchaca; and Captain Callahan himself. Their tale is sometimes brutal, sometimes poignant, and compelling to the last word.

In A Different Dragon Entirely, novelist McBride acknowledges his half-century love of dragon fantasy literature by writing a dragon novel. Being a life-long Texan, McBride pictured his dragon as Texas-centric.Suppose one little horny toad grew from four inches long to the size of a house, sported batwings, flew high in the sky, squirted acidic blood hundreds of yards, and ate buffalo. That aptly describes Leine, the main character in a dragon fantasy tale set on the Texas frontier in 1840. Leine is a unique giant flying Texas horny toad in a story that is vaguely inspired by British author Naomi Novik’s Temeraire Napoleonic dragon series.Real horny toads are native to western North American and are becoming ever more rare. McBride saw them occasionally as a boy, but his last encounter was twenty years ago in New Mexico. The subspecies of Texas horny toads enjoys the ability to spurt streams of stinky blood from their eyes. The squatty little lizards are just 3 to 4 inches long and are wide, almost oval shaped, yet they can squirt defensive coyote-deterring blood up to three feet. Looking closely at a Texas horny toad head-on, one sees an oddly appealing dragon face if ever there was one—a wide mouth, amber scales and a row of tall spikes over its round eyes.McBride, through the efforts of the book’s first character, created a huge dragon from a little horny toad. In addition to magically up-sizing the palm-sized lizard, Padre Renato, an old Scottish rake-turned-priest, surgically added bat wings and a couple of other enhancements providing a tinge of the Frankenstein-esque to Leine.Written for young adults, A Different Dragon Entirely has ongoing action with a cast of settlers, outlaws, and Indians. Leine herself, now house-size after living in solitude on the Texas frontier for 100 years, is confronted by Mally Gunn, a defiant 15-year-old farm girl. During a traumatic first encounter when the dragon eats the girl’s valuable appaloosa mare, the two begin their telepathic talk in Latin, aided by an ancient Druid-Christian gold necklace.In spite of their first meeting, somehow the resolute teenage girl and the dragon with a ravenous appetite forge a unique bond. Yet, uncertainty bedevils the friendship. Is Leine human behind her amber scales? Or, is her prickly personality the camouflage of a cunning demon, as Mally’s family suspects? When the brutal war between Texas’ Native Americans and white settlers touches Mally’s family, will the formidable dragon take sides?The action follows the historical 1840 great Comanche Raid in which 600 warriors rode from Central Texas to the Gulf of Mexico, burning towns and carrying out terrible depredations on the white population of early Texas. Historically, the raid ended in the Battle of Plum Creek. In McBride’s novel, Mally and Leine use wooden canteen bombs to stage a rescue aided by a whalebone corset in this dragon-fueled alternative history of the largest Indian raid in Texas history.Yet, for all its action set in the nascent Republic of Texas, A Different Dragon Entirely is in its core a girl-meets-dragon story