Love Medicine: A Novel (P.S.)
by Louise Erdrich
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Read in April, 2008
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Read in June, 2007
Before I had yet read Karen Manuelito’s examination of the intersection of interests between indigenous “womanisms,” highlighting particularly the commonalities between the experiences of African American and American Indian women, I noted the similarities between the emphases on female experience in Morrison’s Beloved and Erdrich’s Love Medicine. It’s not by accident that Morrison’s is one of the strongest voices in the chorus of praise on the back cover of the novel, noting that ...more
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Read in June, 1987
Erdrich's first and still best-known work (because it's the one most often taught) has become something of a model for the contemporary short-story cycle, with interconnected stories devoted to a variety of interrelated characters spanning three (almost four) generations. The strength here is less in story (which centers on a love triangle and its effect on family ties) or character (vivid as they may be, they're still devoted women and unreliable men) than in style. I wouldn't call it lyrical b...more
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That Erdrich is one of the great geniuses of our time, is, I would think, a settled matter at this point. This early work makes pretty clear how we have collectively arrived at that conclusion.
Described as a novel, Love Medicine is more of a collection of interconnected stories, each told from a different point of view. Each of the stories can stand on its own, but when one reads the entire book, the cumulative impact is borderline overwhelming.
I don't know that any other book has ever evoke...more
Described as a novel, Love Medicine is more of a collection of interconnected stories, each told from a different point of view. Each of the stories can stand on its own, but when one reads the entire book, the cumulative impact is borderline overwhelming.
I don't know that any other book has ever evoke...more
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recommends it for:
starbitrary
The rating system is starting to get to me. It is one way that the internet is rearranging values by inventing new value systems that are increasingly circumscribed. I mean, what choice do I have if my reading does not fit into five stars? Maybe it is too good or unreadable or maybe I just don't think lit up stars are an applicable way to express how I felt about it. What if I begin to judge everyone by similar ratings? I am walking down the street thinking "Oh. She is for sure two s...more
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this book is a complex story of 2 native american rival families, both dealing with the struggles of life. Their consistantly being forced to evacuate the land they own and move into a smaller reservation while all the government really wants is their land for money. You experience the loss of life, the birth of life, love, sensuality etc. You learn of values and morals, traditions and religions, sacrifice and plain out craziness. The title comes from a ritual that native americans use to have. ...more
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Read in May, 2008
recommended to Eileen by:
anyone who wants to explore the Native American experience
The other night at our book group meeting to discuss LOVE MEDICINE, we discovered that our newest member is, like author Louise Erdrich, part Ojibwe. Needless to say, our discussion was very enriched and colored by her stories about her own Native American experiences.
Erdrich's first novel is more like a series of short stories and brief introductions to all her follow-on novels. In each subsequent book she picks up a "thread" of one character or branch of the (incredibly complex) ...more
Erdrich's first novel is more like a series of short stories and brief introductions to all her follow-on novels. In each subsequent book she picks up a "thread" of one character or branch of the (incredibly complex) ...more
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This sounds like some cheesy romance novel, but it's far from that. I first encountered it in an American novels course, where you usually run into things like Gatsby or Huck Finn. Initially, this seemed like an odd choice in such a setting, but it belongs.
Erdrich is part Chippewa/Ojibway, and this book is set on a Native American reservation in a time period spanning about seven decades, beginning in the 1930s. It reads a lot like a Faulkner novel (except more readable, at least initiall...more
Erdrich is part Chippewa/Ojibway, and this book is set on a Native American reservation in a time period spanning about seven decades, beginning in the 1930s. It reads a lot like a Faulkner novel (except more readable, at least initiall...more
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Read in May, 1995
recommends it for:
novel & short story enthusiasts
To write a novel, start with a good short story. Then, write another. Then, another. Recycle your characters, put them all together, and you have a novel.
Yes, I'm being glib. Actually, I'm a big fan of Louise Erdrich's work. She transitioned from poetry to short stories into novels, and while the transition was not seamless, it was, and still is, a journey and a growth the reader can experience with her. Her early novels do read like short story collections with the imagistic i...more
Yes, I'm being glib. Actually, I'm a big fan of Louise Erdrich's work. She transitioned from poetry to short stories into novels, and while the transition was not seamless, it was, and still is, a journey and a growth the reader can experience with her. Her early novels do read like short story collections with the imagistic i...more
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Has a copy to sell/swap
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Read in January, 2005
recommends it for:
anyone
Read this because this was Amanda's choice in our book club. Was a little hesitant because I sort of need to stumble into liking a female author. I'm a bit of a chauvanist when it comes to reading. I do like a lot of female authors, but I don't seek out new ones ( I know I should-I don't know why I do this but I'm aware that I do) I need to be broadsided with them. It was slow going in the beginning, I didn't really get into the characters..especially the mom and the more the novel went alon...more
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Read in June, 2008
recommended to michelle by:
Ruth Pittard
A book like this makes me wish I could live up to that English BA that I supposedly am. Still reading...
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Louise Erdrich has an amazing grasp of metaphors and descriptive language. The most shocking aspect of the novel so far is Marie's violent and soul churning encounters with Sister Leopolda. The first person narrative jumps between characters and years, dividing voices and perspectives which changes your sympathy and empathy for characters often, but not confusingly.
I'm dis...more
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Louise Erdrich has an amazing grasp of metaphors and descriptive language. The most shocking aspect of the novel so far is Marie's violent and soul churning encounters with Sister Leopolda. The first person narrative jumps between characters and years, dividing voices and perspectives which changes your sympathy and empathy for characters often, but not confusingly.
I'm dis...more
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Read in November, 2007
I read "Love Medicine" as an anthologized short story twice before I finally picked up the entire book. "Love Medicine" is one of the three most moving short stories I've ever read. Lipsha Morrissey's voice, his eye on the world, his confidence in his gift to heal, and . . . well, this implies the wrong metaphor, but his faith in the midst of suffering, his longing to connect to his own history despite its knotted-ness makes him a vivid and resonant character. Don't we all ha...more
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Read in June, 2008
For the first time I know of, over half the people in my boodgroup didn’t finish the book. Clearly not a page-turner! The book is especially hard to get started, its about an extended group of Chippewa families in North Dakota. It jumps around in time, and the family relations are impossible to keep straight (the later editions of the book have a family tree in the front, but others said that didn’t really help). What did help was to read it as a series of short stories, and not worry so...more
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Read in January, 2007
recommends it for:
Those who love good fiction set in the great plains, especially with quirky characters
This series of connected short stories with multiple narrators is set between 1934 and 1984 in North Dakota; most of the characters are Native-American or "half-breed" Chippewa. Erdrich is a lovely writer. Some passages are like poetry, others humerous, and still others terribly poignant and tragic. I was wowed by this book and am anxious to read her others; in fact, have most of her others in my TBR stack since reading this one. *Read for my F2F book group* It is recommended that...more
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Read in January, 1990
recommends it for:
those interested in what real rez life is like
i visited the reservation where this story takes place. my ex's mother drive me past all the houses where the "characters" lived and explained to me how the rez was not happy about louise's book. it was quite interesting. i actually read this a couple of years before moving out west, so it was ultra fascinating to have the chance to realize how fiction and truth meet and mingle. that trivia aside...the book was as much an eye opener as the visit was. debunks the way we romanticize the ...more
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Read in August, 2007
recommends it for:
fans of Erdrich
For this book, I debated between three and four stars, but ultimately I gave it only three because it paled in comparison with Master Butchers Singing Club. And, for the same reason I felt The Beet Queen did: it wasn't cohesive enough. Not because different narrators told different parts of the story or the same parts in different ways (that was brilliantly done), but because ultimately you never connected with any of the characters. That being said, I felt a couple of chapters ("The Red Co...more
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Louise Erdrich (in a tie with Barbara Kingsolver) might be my favorite author. Native American literature in short story format, Love Medicine is the first in a long series of books about the same groups of Native American families throughout several generations. The characters are captivating and their predicaments are interesting. More interesting is when they show up in later books at different times/dates in their lives and you get the opportunity to see them through other characters' eye...more
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Okay, so I'm really exploring native traditional values these day. Having an elder teacher has opened my eyes to a lot of how much we DON'T understand the culture and values and traditions of the original people of this land. I got a lot out of this book. It presented real people who were fallibel in their lives and in their expression of love itself. It was gritty and real. ANd non-linear in it's approach which befits the traditional view of life and interconnectedness of all beings. Easy to ge...more
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The first in Erdrich's brilliant series of novels set on a Chippewa reservation in North Dakota, this beautiful and lyrical story gives us our first introduction to the Kashpaw and Lamartine families, with whom we will become much more familiar in ensuing novels. The compelling narrations from the different characters' viewpoints provide a perspective on reservation life that is sometimes all-too-real, as we are informed about the many travails of the residents of the res. The story is not witho...more
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Read in January, 2002
loved it. have to read again. prose is the best. couldn't quite figure out what the point was, though.
i finally re-read it! after reading Tracks and Four Souls. It definitely helps to have some kind of family chart to keep all the characters/voices in order, although part of the experience is also not knowing for sure... what i admire about erdrich is that her stories are told by a community of characters, but without canceling the individual's perspective. love medicine maybe especially ce...more
i finally re-read it! after reading Tracks and Four Souls. It definitely helps to have some kind of family chart to keep all the characters/voices in order, although part of the experience is also not knowing for sure... what i admire about erdrich is that her stories are told by a community of characters, but without canceling the individual's perspective. love medicine maybe especially ce...more
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