<a href="https://annemontgomerywriter.com/" title="Author Anne Montgomery " rel="home">Author Anne Montgomery

Released August 4, 2025

The past and present collide when a tenacious reporter seeks information on an eleventh century magician…and uncovers more than she bargained for.

In 1939, archaeologists uncovered a 900-year-old tomb at the Northern Arizona site called Ridge Ruin. The man, bedecked in fine turquoise jewelry and intricate bead work, was surrounded by hundreds of extraordinary funerary objects, including wooden swords with handles carved into animal hooves and human hands. The Hopi workers stepped back from the grave, knowing what the Moochiwimi sticks meant. This man was a magician.

Sixty-five years later, investigative reporter Kate Butler discovers evidence that The Magician looked notably different from those who buried him. Her quest to discover The Magician’s origin carries her back to a time when the high desert world was shattered by the birth of a volcano and into the present-day dangers of archaeological looting where black market sales of antiquities can lead to murder.

Amazon

Bookstores, libraries, and other booksellers can order copies directly from the Ingram Catalog.

Praise for Wolf Catcher

“Blending archaeology and Native American mythology, “Wolf Catcher” by novelist Anne Montgomery is an original, exceptionally well written, and compelling work of historical fiction…” – Midwest Book Review

“The author’s ability to interweave the past and the present was masterful. The characters were complex and interesting, especially with the underlying theme of rethinking the history of worldly human migration … A real page turner and I am wondering when the movie is going to be made!” – Alicia Williams Goodreads

“The story is very well-paced, reaching a page-turning, action-packed climax to the end. This story has all the elements of a great suspense drama centered around a historical mystery.” – Heidi Slowinski Author

“I was deeply and thoroughly embroiled in this imaginative novel… (that) melds seamlessly much of fact with fiction. Totally recommended! “ – V. Williams Vine Voice

“What a journey! What a story! A truly epic tale that grabs you by a throat and moves your soul. Highly recommend for the readers of all age groups.” – Marina Sardarova Author

“Boy, didn’t this one grip me quickly and keep me glued to the pages! Loved the cliff-hanging chapter endings. Well researched, well-plotted and paced…Trust me, you’ll love it. Totally recommended and out now!” – Rosepoint Publishing

“Once again the author has created a beautiful story with a powerful message. She took a piece of history and brought it to life. I just can’t say enough good things about Wolf Catcher.” – Megan Salcido Wildwood Reads

Anne Montgomery’s novels can be found wherever books are sold.

A lesson learned: The dead and their funerary objects need to be respected

August 30, 2025Leave a comment

***When I was asked by Arizona Highways Magazine to write an article about the man they call The Magician, I didn’t understand that I might be trampling on Native American religious beliefs.*** **(Illustration by Brad Holland)**

I’m not a religious person, so I have, in the past, missed signs that had spiritual implications. For example, when I was researching my novel Wolf Catcher—which was just rereleased by Next Chapter Publishing—I didn’t understand how offensive some of my requests were.

I was hired to write a magazine article about the man they call The Magician. His fabulous, nine-hundred-year-old tomb had been uncovered by archaeologists in 1939, beneath a pueblo on a lonely hillside about ten miles from Flagstaff, Arizona. Back in those days, exhuming indigenous burial grounds was an acceptable practice, which now seems absurd. Logically speaking, there’s not much difference between rifling through the belongings of ancient mummies and digging up one’s modern-day grandmother. Imagine collecting jewelry from grandma’s body and selling her precious possessions on eBay.

As a kid, I sometimes visited the Museum of Natural History in New York, where burial offerings from around the world were often on exhibit. However, while trying to determine who The Magician might have been, I discovered just how offensive it is to put human remains and funerary objects on display. My first hint was a letter my editor at the magazine received when I ignorantly requested a DNA test on The Magician. My reasoning seemed sound. The Magician was described by those who found him as being physically different from the people who buried him in several ways. He was particularly tall for his time and did not resemble the Native Americans who populated the region. He was said to have some Caucasian facial features, so my first thought was how did a man who may have had some European ancestry make it to what would become the American Southwest almost one-thousand years ago.

My request for scientific analysis was met with a hard no from the Hopi tribal authorities. The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990 stipulates that all remains and funerary objects must be treated with respect and dignity and that the destruction of any portion of a body—even something as seemingly insignificant as a tooth for a DNA sample—is unacceptable and illegal.

At that point, I was so focused on getting my story done, I didn’t understand why my request for scientific testing was such a big deal. Then, when I arrived to interview an archaeologist I’d worked with previously, I was shocked when he didn’t appear. It would be another archaeologist who would gently explain the problem. These scientists are bound by their relationships with Native American tribes. If they want to dig on tribal or even public land, they must get permission. If they don’t follow the rules, they will be shut out, which would hurt their reputations and limit their ability to work. My investigation posed a threat to the man’s career, a risk he wasn’t willing to take.

While researching the story, I picked up a number of pottery shards. My logic was simple. I was on public land, so clearly I had committed no crime. But again, I was wrong. Those beautiful pieces of ancient fired clay, many so bright and vibrant they looked as if they’d been painted yesterday, should never have been taken from their resting places, because once you’ve removed an artifact from its setting, you’ve destroyed its sense of time and place—it’s historical significance—something you can never get back.

After finishing Wolf Catcher, I found myself staring at those thousand-year-old bits of pottery and couldn’t pretend I hadn’t done something wrong. I spoke about my feelings with a friend who was a nondenominational pastor. She quickly responded that I should put the pieces back where I found them.

She and I traveled to Ridge Ruin where I gently returned the shards to the hillside. We stood on the rocky ground under which the pueblo that housed The Magician’s body lay hidden, having long ago been backfilled to protect it from looters. I stared at the spot where the man had been buried with such reverence all those years ago. My friend asked me to apologize for my mistake, which I did.

As I said earlier, I’m not a religious person, and yet, as we left that windswept hillside that held the remains of Ridge Ruin in its belly, I felt better. And I promised myself I would not make the same mistakes again.

If you’d like to learn more about my quest to understand who The Magician might have been and what his world was like, read my novel Wolf Catcher.

Wolf Catcher

Anne Montgomery

Historical Fiction

Released August 4, 2025

The past and present collide when a tenacious reporter seeks information on an eleventh century magician…and uncovers more than she bargained for.

Amazon

Bookstores, libraries, and other booksellers can order copies directly from the Ingram Catalog.

Praise for Wolf Catcher

“I was deeply and thoroughly embroiled in this imaginative novel… (that) melds seamlessly much of fact with fiction. Totally recommended! “ – V. Williams Vine Voice

“What a journey! What a story! A truly epic tale that grabs you by a throat and moves your soul. Highly recommend for the readers of all age groups.” – Marina Sardarova Author

Anne Montgomery’s novels can be found wherever books are sold.

The problem with history: Who did “discover” America?

August 23, 20252 Comments

***Every school child in the U.S. is taught that Columbus discovered America. But we now understand that, long before Columbus, land and sea travelers were coming to America’s shores.***

Every time I tried to determine if an 11^th century man with Eurasian ancestors had inhabited what would one day be the American Southwest, the same problem kept cropping up. I was thwarted by history books. “In 1492 Columbus discovered America!” School children in the U.S. have been taught this one-sided “fact” since the beginning of our nation’s founding.

Today, most of us understand people were in the Americas for thousands of years before Columbus led his three little ships toward what Europeans would call the New World. Note that archeological and genetic evidence currently put the date somewhere between 16,000 and 25,000 years. So the Americas had long since been discovered by humans when Columbus touched down in what is today the Bahamas.

Humans probably first approached the Americas during the last ice age, a time when low sea levels exposed a land bridge at what is now the Bering Strait between Russia and Alaska, perhaps pursuing big game across the isthmus. These hunter-gatherers would eventually populate the Americas from end-to-end, some establishing advanced civilizations which rivaled any cultures on Earth, ones that excelled in mathematics, astronomy, engineering, architecture, and the arts.

But history is rarely clear-cut. When I was researching The Magician—whose burial was discovered just east of Flagstaff, Arizona in 1939—I kept getting hung up on the fact that he didn’t look like the people who populated the high desert at the time. While I understand that ascribing features to mummified individuals is not an exact science, his height and facial structure seemed unlike the Hopi ancestors who so reverently placed him in a remarkable tomb bearing 600 funerary objects, one that’s been called the richest burial in the history of the American Southwest.

I wondered then if there might have been other outliers. Descendants of Eurasians who managed to make it to the Americas many millennia ago, perhaps in such such small numbers they were rarely if ever noticed. I would discover that possibility in two ways. One involved fabric and the other a rare burial practice.

It began with a discovery in the late 1980’s when strange, perfectly preserved mummies appeared in a remote desert area of China. Inordinately tall with reddish-brown hair, the Tarim mummies bore little resemblance to modern-day Chinese people and gave credence to stories of what many supposed were just myths about towering people with blue or green eyes, full beards, long noses and red or blond hair. Some wore tartan or plaid created on sophisticated looms, a textile type that was similar to ancient fragments located in present-day Austria. And there was another curious thing. These desert dwellers buried their dead in boats, an exceedingly rare custom, one mostly associated with Vikings. DNA studies showed the mummies were in fact Ancient North Eurasians—a genetic mix of Asian and European peoples—a group of hunter-gathers once wide-spread, but who mostly disappeared 10,000 years ago. Today, the only remaining traces of Ancient North Eurasians are in Indigenous people in Siberia and the Americas.

So, might The Magician’s ancestors have come from these people? Of course, it is impossible to know. However, the genetic mixing of our ancient ancestors is undeniable. Certainly, inherited traits could have trickled down through the generations, periodically producing people who looked different than those around them. A case in point is the scientific research into blue-eyed humans. Studies now indicate that all people with this trait are descended from a single ancestor, one with a genetic mutation which occurred between 6,000-10,000 years ago. Today between 8-10% of people world-wide have blue eyes.

While we will never know why The Magician was different from his peers, we do know he was a highly revered individual, one whose interment was extraordinary and which in hindsight should have been left undisturbed. Today, archeologists do not dig up remains and funerary objects and put them on display, since it’s morally reprehensible. And according to the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, it’s a crime.

Though back in 1939 The Magician was unearthed and placed in a museum, today he and his funerary objects have been returned to the ground, reburied in a secret place, with the same honor and reverence the Hopi ancestors afforded him all those years ago.

If you’d like to learn more about the man they called The Magician, I encourage you to read my book Wolf Catcher, which not only delves into the hunt for who he might have been, but also shines a light on life in the high desert almost a millennia ago.

Wolf Catcher

Anne Montgomery

Historical Fiction

Released August 4, 2025

The past and present collide when a tenacious reporter seeks information on an eleventh century magician…and uncovers more than she bargained for.

Universal Book Link

Amazon

Bookstores, libraries, and other booksellers can order copies directly from the Ingram Catalog.

Praise for Wolf Catcher

“I was deeply and thoroughly embroiled in this imaginative novel… (that) melds seamlessly much of fact with fiction. Totally recommended! “ – V. Williams Vine Voice

“What a journey! What a story! A truly epic tale that grabs you by a throat and moves your soul. Highly recommend for the readers of all age groups.” – Marina Sardarova Author

Anne Montgomery’s novels can be found wherever books are sold.

How a sports reporter ended up writing about history

August 16, 2025August 17, 20253 Comments

***The fabulous, Palaeolithic cave paintings in Lascaux,*** ***France inspired my love of ancient history when I was a child.***

This is my 500th blog! Which is shocking. I could never have imagined back in 2017 that eight years later I’d still be at it. Since I like telling stories and enjoy the process, I guess you’re stuck with me.

I know exactly when my interest in ancient history was sparked. I recall a TV program that showcased fabulous 17,000-year-old cave paintings of animals in Lascaux, France, drawings that inspired me to grab a hammer and chisel and head out into my Northern New Jersey garage. I was maybe 12, and can you blame me for wanting to see what ancient people might have left inside the walls of my home? With visions of paintings and arrow points and pottery dancing in my head, I hammered away at that wall. That is until my mother arrived, pointy-toed high heels clacking on the driveway. She gazed at me through black, cat eye glasses. It wasn’t until that moment that I sensed I might be doing something wrong. I dropped my tools and ran. The rest of the weekend I had to stand and watch my father as he repaired the damaged wall, muttering under his breath the whole time.

***The Mesoamerican ballgame might have looked like a cross between basketball and ice hockey.***

I have been fascinated by what happened long ago for almost 60 years. How human lives have changed in myriad ways, but are the same in many others. Still, history was far from my regular world where I spent much of my time involved with sports as both a journalist and an amateur official.

Still, it was my involvment in sports that gave me my first opportunity to write about history. I was hired by Arizona Highways Magazine to research a story on Mesoamerican ballcourts. It turns out there are over 200 ballcourts in Arizona alone, a testament to the popularity of the contest, which looked a bit like basketball with participants padded rather similarly to modern-day ice hockey players.

It was while researching that story that I accidentally discovered the man they call The Magician. I remember the day I arrived at the lonely, high-desert site about ten miles from Flagstaff. Cold raindrops fell on scattered junipers, their piney scent mixed with that of dampened earth. The ground was a rocky mixture of small chunks of red basalt and black cinder left from the eruption of the Sunset Crater Volcano almost 900-hundred years earlier. Beautiful pottery fragments with intricate black-and-white designs littered the hillside. I was interviewing an archeologist from the Museum of Northern Arizona about the ballcourts when he pointed up the slope. “That’s where they found The Magician,” he said.

***It was while reseraching a story on ancient Mesoamerican ballcourts–this one at the Wupatki National Monument–that I learned about the man they call The Magician.***

Later, I looked into the discovery. The fantastic grave was uncovered in 1939 and filled with over 600 exquisite funerary objects: arrow points and pots, mineral specimens and shells from the far-off Pacific Ocean. Fine turquoise jewelry, intricate beaded items, paint pigments, baskets, and mosaics. Then, there were the wooden swords with handles carved into animal hooves and human hands, objects that identified the man as a sword swallower and a magician.

My novel Wolf Catcher tells two stories. One follows Kate Butler, a former TV reporter who’s no longer pretty enough to be in front of a camera. She’s turned to print reporting, but can’t get anyone to talk about the The Magician. Still, Kate, who has given up any dreams of a personal life to concentrate on her work, is determined to finish the job. Kate’s story mirrors my own, with the exception of the time when bullets are flying.

Kaya lives at the Village on the Ridge in the late 11^th century, shortly after the waking of the Volcano God, whose eruption changed the lives of the people in the high desert. Some, like those on the Ridge, were blessed, while others were left to wander the landscape homeless and hungry. Kaya is a healer who, like Kate, has given up a personal life for her vocation. She is tasked with tending an odd-looking injured man who the People call Wolf Catcher. The massive white wolf that appears with him is both fascinating and frightening. Some believe the arrival of the two is a harbinger.

Wolf Catcher tells the modern-day story of a reporter’s quest to determine whether the descendants of ancient Euroasian people somehow arrived in the New World thousands of years earlier than previously believed and discusses the problems associated with archeological looting and the black market sales of antiquities. It also delves into personal choices and relationships, proving human beings have not changed all that much over the centuries.

Wolf Catcher

Anne Montgomery

Historical Fiction

Released August 4, 2025

The past and present collide when a tenacious reporter seeks information on an eleventh century magician…and uncovers more than she bargained for.

Universal Book Link

Amazon

Praise for Wolf Catcher

“The author’s ability to interweave the past and the present was masterful. The characters were complex and interesting, especially with the underlying theme of rethinking the history of worldly human migration. A real page turner and I am wondering when the movie is going to be made!” – Alicia Williams Goodreads

“I was deeply and thoroughly embroiled in this imaginative novel… (that) melds seamlessly much of fact with fiction. Totally recommended! “ – V. Williams Vine Voice

“What a journey! What a story! A truly epic tale that grabs you by a throat and moves your soul. Highly recommend for the readers of all age groups.” – Marina Sardarova Author

Bookstores, libraries, and other booksellers can order copies directly from the Ingram Catalog.

Anne Montgomery’s novels can be found wherever books are sold.