From Powells.com
The writers your life won't be complete without.
Staff Pick
Erdrich's writing runs deep with 14 acclaimed novels, including The Round House (winner of the National Book Award) and The Plague of Doves (a Pulitzer finalist). While it's likely you've read her more recent titles, to get the keenest sense of Erdrich and her heritage, it's well worth it to return to the first novel of her Native American series, Love Medicine. Winner of the 1984 National Book Critics Circle Award, Love Medicine is heartbreaking, raw, and mesmerizing. The story exposes the heart and soul of the Kashpaw and Lamartine families living on a North Dakota reservation, across generations. Erdrich's writing is colorful and melodic throughout, with breathtaking passages like her depiction of Grandpa Kashpaw: "Elusive, pregnant with history, his thoughts finned off and vanished. The same color as water." Fans and readers new to Erdrich alike should not miss this classic. Recommended By Kim S., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
Love Medicine is Louise Erdrich's masterful debut novel, one of the most influential, beloved, and distinguished works of contemporary fiction. It is the unforgettable saga of two families and how their destinies intertwine over the course of fifty years on and around a North Dakota reservation. Here is the book that heralded the arrival of a major voice in American literature.
Synopsis
"The beauty of Love Medicine saves us from being completely devastated by its power." -- Toni Morrison
Set on a North Dakota Ojibwe reservation, Love Medicine--the first novel from master storyteller and National Book Award-winning author Louise Erdrich--is an epic story about the intertwined fates of two families: the Kashpaws and the Lamartines.
With astonishing virtuosity, each chapter of this stunning novel draws on a range of voices to limn its tales. Black humor mingles with magic, injustice bleeds into betrayal, and through it all, bonds of love and family marry the elements into a tightly woven whole that pulses with the drama of life.
Erdrich has written a multigenerational portrait of strong men and women caught in an unforgettable whirlwind of anger, desire, and the healing power that is love medicine.
Synopsis
The stunning first novel in Louise Erdrich's Native American series, Love Medicine tells the story of two families, the Kashpaws and the Lamartines. Written in Erdrich's uniquely poetic, powerful style, it is a multi-generational portrait of strong men and women caught in an unforgettable drama of anger, desire, and the healing power that is love medicine.
Synopsis
Set on and around a North Dakota Ojibwe reservation, Love Medicine the first novel by bestselling, National Book Award-winning author Louise Erdrich is the epic story about the intertwined fates of two families: the Kashpaws and the Lamartines.
With astonishing virtuosity, each chapter draws on a range of voices to limn its tales. Black humor mingles with magic, injustice bleeds into betrayal, and through it all, bonds of love and family marry the elements into a tightly woven whole that pulses with the drama of life.
Filled with humor, magic, injustice and betrayal, Erdrich blends family love and loyalty in a stunning work of dramatic fiction"
Synopsis
The first book in Erdrich's Native American tetralogy that includes The Beet Queen, Tracks, and The Bingo Palace is an authentic and emotionally powerful glimpse into the Native American experience — now resequenced and expanded to include never-before-published chapters.
About the Author
Louise Erdrich is the author of fourteen novels as well as volumes of poetry, short stories, children's books, and a memoir of early motherhood. Her novel The Round House won the 2012 National Book Award. She lives in Minnesota, where she owns the bookstore Birchbark Books.