The Insufficiency of Maps: A Novel

by Nora Pierce

In this powerful debut novel by award-winning Nora Pierce, a young girl must discover the meaning of self and family as she struggles to find her place between two contrasting realities.On the reservation, Alice lives in a run-down trailer. Both her parents are alcoholics. She seldom has enough food and she rarely attends school, but she is free to follow her imagination. She is connected to the life and ancestry of her people and the deep love she receives from her family and community.When her mother succumbs to schizophrenia, Alice is removed from her home and placed with a white foster family in the suburbs. This new world is neat and tidy and wholesome, but it is also alien, and Alice is unmoored from everything she has ever known and everything that has defined her.As she traces Alice's journey between two cultures, Pierce asks probing questions about identity and difference, and she articulates vital truths about the contemporary Native American experience. Utterly authentic and lyrically compelling, this novel establishes Pierce as an important voice in American literature.

Genres: Fiction, Family, Novels, Native American, Young Adult, Modern, Book Club

224 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2007

Reviews

[Cyd · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book while traveling and was pleased to have it. It held my interst and was a fine read.

My reaction in the end however is somewhat mixed. I was distracted by the similarities between this book and White Oleander and while they certainly deal with topics that deserve to be looked at often and from many angles, I still spent more time being reminded of the other book instead of simply taking in the story.

The other thing--and I hope this isn't a spoiler--is that the "take home message" was a bit muddled. On the face of it, it seems that basically Native American children--especially those from homes dealing with alcoholism and mental illness--have no hope and frankly white people who want to help just shouldn't try because even a good faith effort isn't going to be good enough. (In fact while Alice runs into cluelessness and prejudice after she goes into foster care with the new school and her foster family's extended family, the family itself is clearly trying to do what's best and accepts Alice for who and what she is.

[Janice · Rating 2 out of 5]

Young native American girl, Alice, must contend with losing her mother to an institution and being ripped away from the only family she's ever known. She spends years living with a white family, but she never feels like she belongs.

When she gets word much later in the book that her mother has died, she goes searching for the only home she's known.

There is the obligatory scene of the crazy Native American woman being taken advantage of sexually by the cops – and I'm sure it has happened, but it just seemed so familiar. (I feel like I read this in another book, I just can't remember which)

The young girl also has an attachment to fire. That's the scene we are left with at the end. Her burning her stuff and stuff from a local dig. I guess she's being reborn?!?

[Jeanne · Rating 3 out of 5]

Alice is the child of a woman, Amalie, who is both mentally ill and an alcoholic. They are living on a reservation when we meet them. Life is hard. Alice is gifted with imagination and lives a rich inner life. However, as she ages, reality hits hard. There was much I liked about the book - the cultural background and the love that shines through the madness. Most of the book follows Alice as a very young child. I felt that end of the book gave short shrift to her teenage years and I was disappointed. I wanted to spend more time with Alice.

[Margaret]

The title of this book is the first thing that drew me in and I found it to be a fit title for the story. I found this story poignant, bittersweet and sad yet unfortunately probably realistic and I enjoyed reading it. My only negative is that there was no real ending that would have put a kind of "final" stamp on the story. Maybe that was part of the realism.

[Jillian OConnell · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked it and didn’t

This book is written in first person from the perspective, at the beginning, of a very young child. I found the perspective a bit frustrating as it limited the author to a child’s understanding of the world, therefore limiting the depth of the narrative and description.

[Lorilei Beer · Rating 3 out of 5]

More atmosphere than story of an Indian child of a schizophrenic mother who is shuffled from her home to her grandpa's to foster home --harsh and unsettling -- more a rendering than a story

[Angela · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very sad and a bit disjointed. I feel like the author wants us to embrace the American Indian culture but only shows the dark and ugly.

[Laura Pakaln · Rating 4 out of 5]

A gripping debut novel!

[Ann Marie · Rating 1 out of 5]

well I don't know what to think...Alice is a child...she also tells the story...I think she aged ten years thru the story...but the story?...it seems to paint a dim picture of the American Indian and I am not certain this was what the author intended...for me it seemed as if everyone of Indian origin in this story was either smoking dope or drinking...noone took care of the child...the flow is choppy at best...and nothing is really settled in the end...it's as if the book tried to become a story the whole reading...I cannot recommend this one and I am sorry I continued after feeling so emty by page 95...I have eight boks waiting on me...I should have stopped hours ago...reviews say beautifully written and wonderful story but what was the story??? beautifully written? I feel awful giving it the star value I did but I feel the need to be honest...I would hate for anyone to go into this thinking it was going to get better

I am adding in order to correct my review...I may have been just a little tired and perhaps slightly upset with myself for continuing this one when I wrte the above...it does not change my opinion but may be helpful to someone else...Alice is a child....at the start of the book she has not started chool so she is between the age of four and six (does not really matter)she wants to belong somewhere, to have a home, to have a place where she truly belongs - where she can root and be rooted...there you have it...that is the story...

[Lindsay · Rating 2 out of 5]

I picked up this book because I saw it in the stacks and I loved the title. Although at points I thought it had promise, ultimately I found the first half sad almost to the point of being exploitative and the second half a quick run to a conclusion that was unsatisfying given the detail in the first half of the book. Also, the voice of the protagonist didn't feel right to me. It is written in first person, present tense and at times the voice does sound like a child's as it should (in her thoughts she thinks of "Mommy" and is confused about what is going on around her) but at other times the voice is elevated (at one point she uses the word "nebula" which is not a word a young child- especially a neglected young child- would know). These slips in the voice felt uncontrolled rather than a narrative device and distracted me while I was reading.

It was not a bad book overall, but I would not recommend it to anyone.

[S. Harrell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pierce's finesse in relaying the landscape of a child's life through the delicate filter of her young perspective is brilliant. It's terribly challenging to write a child's first person point of view in an adult work, and Pierce accomplishes it masterfully. Through this naive lens the author gives tremendous insight into cultural wealth and poverty, mental illness and the soaring imagination inextricably tied to it, as well as the emotional hurdles of a child displaced by virtually everyone. What stability little Alice lacks in family and tribe Pierce returns to her tenfold with a compassionate and responsive audience.

[Debra]

From the book jacket: Pierce asks probing questions about identity and difference in the context of the contemporary Native American experience. From me: I love maps, but I love them in the sense of seeing where things are, where I can go, trips I'd like to take, where water runs. My maps I look at regularly are one of Manhattan, one of the water sheds in Austin, one of the archaeological sites in Middle America. Alice, the child in the novel, uses maps to try to find where she came from, and who she is.

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is about a Native American girl growing up in the late sixties. Her mother is schizophrenic and her father is an alcoholic. She is eventually placed in a caucasion foster home after her mother has a breakdown that nearly kills her. It is a sad, touching story, but not particularly well written. The time line gets muddied (she seems to go from 5 to 12 quite quickly) and the prose is a bit repetitive. Still an interesting book.

[Lisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

When Native-American, is five years old, she is taken from her schizophrenic mother and placed in a foster home. As she comes to age, she comes to term with her dysfunctional family and their Native American roots. A short, quick read, recommended for those who enjoyed Sherman Alexie's The Absolutely True Diary of Part-time Indian and want to read more Native American fiction and young adult fiction.

[John Solder · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very real, touching story about a young native girls and her coming to terms with a crazy mother, drunk father, dieing grandfather, her heritage, and trying to fit in to American culture. The books has so many small beautiful and haunting passages that will make you take a step back. Pierce gets in touch with some deep human emotions and does a good job of developing characters. Serious read, but worth it.

[Karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very moving story about a young girl Alice, who is of American Indian descent, and seen from her perspective from when she was about 5 through to 14. Lots of issues such as identity, cultural belonging, family, separation, abuse, mental illness, alcoholism etc - it's not an easy story, but I imagine it is a common one. I think it's also about a mother's love for her child in the face of incredible adversity.

[Sandee · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this debut novel about a young American Indian girl, and her Mother. A raw and gritty story of Indian culture and a life of poverty, alcoholism and wanting to know where she belongs. I was saddened while reading this book, for Alice because she loves her mother despite the illness she has, and the helpless feeling she has about her life in general. Author, Nora Pierce is a wonderful writer and I hope to read more of her works.

[Laurel Deloria · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Pierce's forceful debut, Alice is five when she and her homeless, mentally ill mother, Amalie (Mami, she calls her), arrive at Papi's trailer in an Arizona Indian reservation to live. Papi, a heavy-drinking itinerant laborer, may or may not be Alice's father, but he adores Amalie (who is of Kwytz'an descent) and has been waiting for her to return after years of medication and hospitalization 13related absence.

[Katie M. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Engaging, if choppy, story about a young girl's life with her doting schizophrenic/alcoholic parents, and her subsequent placement with a white foster family. Not a hugely memorable book, but there's a lot of loveliness in here, and some delicate exploration of heavy issues (mental illness, reservation life, fit vs. unfit parents, white-family/fosterkid-of-color dynamic, etc).

[A · Rating 3 out of 5]

A novel about growing up Native American as seen through the eyes of a child who is torn between the people of the "res" (her own heritage), many of whom are broken and dysfunctional, and the White people who take her in as a foster child. Her mother's mental illness make it impossible for the child to stay with her, and we follow the disintegration of the spirit through the child's eyes.

[Marlee Cowan · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first half of the book gets 4.5 stars but the last half only 3 stars. I didn't enjoy the end nearly as much as the beginning...it just didn't have the same spirit or interesting qualities. But the beginning was wonderful, such a clever way to write the story and teach me something at the same time.

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a little hard to connect with, because the narrative is fairly disjointed...but it's very intentionally disjointed and mirrors the turmoil of main character Alice's life. It was very, very sad, as well; the mother in me wanted to gather Alice up in my arms on pretty much every single page.

[Deborah · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is an interesting book about a Native American girl who has a schizophrenic mother. The perspective and style almost make the reader feel like a schizophrenic! It is interesting, though, to see the Native American perspective, both in the native culture and among whites.

[Nikki]

I read this book in one night. I was compelled and drawn in by the story. Now, I want to set it aside and reread it in a few weeks to see if it is actually a good piece of writing or just a truly compelling story and character.

[Akire · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very honest and sometimes heartbreaking story. A little girls account of what it is like to live on an Indian reservation and the struggles with alcoholism. it gives us a peak of what life is like when you have a parent with a mental disease.

[Laurie · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't love this book for several reasons. The story line is depressing with regard to the plight of the modern day native American and I didn't really learn anything new. While I feel it was well written, it certainly did not leave me 'wanting more'.

[Diane · Rating 5 out of 5]

A raw and jagged read about the pain of growing up with a parent suffering from mental illness, foster families and the struggle of fitting in, defining culturals when roots are missing... A great read for everyone, but many of my Native American students will especially enjoy this one.

[Maria · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think I just picked this book up randomly at the library. It was a quick read, perfectly fine, but I'm sure I didn't get it. A lot about the girls' obsession with maps, bones, and artifacts, but I didn't get any of it.

[C. Adam Volle · Rating 2 out of 5]

Didn't have to look up the author online after finishing this flat little chore to know I'd been ambushed once again, by that most predictable and grating sub-genre in literature: the First Novel Produced Within A University's Creative Writing Department.

[linnea · Rating 4 out of 5]

Awsome! I loved ths book and ther was one lin tht made me cry.