The last buffalo hunter : a novel
(Book)

Reticent but articulate young Kyle who, on his fourteenth birthday, is given bus tickets to spend the summer in his father's natal state and is remanded to the not-so-tender care of Cole, his blasphemous and outrageous grandfather. Cole, a throwback to the Old West, appears to be waging a one-man war on a whole range of fools in a state where some folks take Norman MacLean literally. As Cole discovers, the twentieth century is fast encroaching on a world where no one ever tells anyone what to do. But the focus of his outrage and ill temper is one Bruce Tipton, a smooth developer who (to quote Cole) not only "thinks the sun rises and sets in the crack of his ass," but is also determined to introduce a fenced park for "wild buffalo" right next to his home. Tipton's chicanery and venality find their match, and more, in Cole's stubbornness and profanity.