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Love Medicine

A member of the Chippewa and Obijwe tribes, Louise Erdrich has been a leading voice in Native American literature for over thirty years. Determined to publish her first book before she turned thirty, Erdrich wrote Love Medicine at the age of twenty nine, and this debut novel won the National Critics Circle Book Award. Following the intricate web woven by the Kapshaw and Nanapush families over the course of fifty years, Erdrich creates real characters that tug on the heartstrings of human emotions. Albertine Johnson has returned to the reservation for the funeral of her Aunt June Morrissey. In this opening chapter we meet her grandparents Nector and Marie Kapshaw and their descendants. Alcoholism is a persistent problem amongst the men, and there is little that the women of the tribe can do to prevent it. We see this especially from Albertine's cousin King Kapshaw who drinks rampantly because he feels that because he married an outsider, that he can get away with drinking. Because of the drinking issues, there have been illicit extra marital affairs, creating a reservation where most people are loosely related to one another. This web of relationships can be traced to Nector Kapshaw who loved two women over his entire life: his wife Marie Kapshaw nee Lazarre and vixen Lulu Lamartine. Between the two women he fathered eight children, six surviving. The Kapshaw and Lamartine blood continued to intermix, creating an environment where strong Indian blood flowed through all the characters veins. Even though drinking and affairs are prevalent on Indian reservations, the women do not condone the behavior. Marie and Lulu remained rivals for Nestor's behavior for his entire life and there was little love for each other even though they moved in the same circles. Erdrich does a masterful job of painting a picture of Native American traditions and beliefs. She briefly touches on the northern lights celebration, her people's lack of trust of white Americans and their forming a tribal council to voice their concern for their rights, and role alcoholism plays amongst natives on reservations who have little else to do with their time. Written in vignette form, Erdrich gives a voice to many characters in three generations of Nanapush/Lamartine and Kapshaw members of the Chippewa tribe. Each character is unique even though they share many of the same genetics and environment. As a result many issues repeat themselves over the course of the fifty years related in the novel. Since the first publication of Love Medicine, Louise Erdrich has gone to write many novels, all focusing on Native American issues. The characters in this first novel can be found in four other of her novels, as Erdrich paints a more vivid picture of their backstories. As she became more successful, Erdrich founded Birchbark Books, with all of the proceeds returning to native Americans. Love Medicine started her career and I enjoyed the imagery and powerful characterizations in this debut novel, which I rate 4.5 bright stars.

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