Rebecca Stuhr is reading Louise Erdrich

Rebecca recently read for the first time Erdrich's first novel, Love Medicine (1984). This was the first of Erdrich's cycle of novels centered around North Dakota, on and off the Indian reservation, with a complex and interrelated group of characters. In Love Medicine, Erdrich uses a fluid chronology and allows each of her characters to tell their own story. Many of the chapters work as individual short stories but are enriched in connection with all of the other chapters. The characters are lost, defiant, triumphant, in mourning or despair, selfish and giving. Rebecca is currently reading The Beet Queen, Erdrich's second novel. Erdrich uses the same technique of allowing each character to tell his or her own story, however, The Beet Queen is a more cohesive plot. These are new characters but the names of some of the characters from Love Medicine enter into the story, and one of the Beet Queen characters is a Kashpaw.

For a list of books by Louise Erdrich, or to which she has contributed follow this link to the Grinnell College Libraries catalog:

http://cat.lib.grinnell.edu/search/a?SEARCH=erdrich+louise&sortdropdown=-

Love Medicine. New York: Holt, Reinhart, and Winston, 1984. New and expanded version, 1993.
Burling 3rd floor PS3555.R42 L6 1984
Burling 3rd floor PS3555.R42 L6 1993

The Beet Queen. New York: Holt, 1986
Burling 3rd floor PS3555.R42 B4 1986