The Round House

A Novel

By: Louise Erdrich

Narrated by: Gary Farmer

Length: 12 hrs and 39 mins

Publisher's summary

National Book Award, Fiction, 2012

One Sunday in the spring of 1988, a woman living on a reservation in North Dakota is attacked. The details of the crime are slow to surface as Geraldine Coutts is traumatized and reluctant to relive or reveal what happened, either to the police or to her husband, Bazil, and 13-year-old son, Joe. In one day, Joe's life is irrevocably transformed. He tries to heal his mother, but she will not leave her bed and slips into an abyss of solitude. Increasingly alone, Joe finds himself thrust prematurely into an adult world for which he is ill prepared.

While his father, who is a tribal judge, endeavors to wrest justice from a situation that defies his efforts, Joe becomes frustrated with the official investigation and sets out with his trusted friends, Cappy, Zack, and Angus, to get some answers of his own. Their quest takes them first to the Round House, a sacred space and place of worship for the Ojibwe. And this is only the beginning.

Written with undeniable urgency, and illuminating the harsh realities of contemporary life in a community where Ojibwe and white live uneasily together, The Round House is a brilliant and entertaining novel, a masterpiece of literary fiction. Louise Erdrich embraces tragedy, the comic, a spirit world very much present in the lives of her all-too-human characters, and a tale of injustice that is, unfortunately, an authentic reflection of what happens in our own world today.

©2012 Louise Erdrich (P)2012 HarperCollinsPublishers

Places Mentioned Known to Reader

Having worked and lived for a period of time on a North Dakota Reservation I found the book of great interest. Also many locations were known to me. St. Luke's was a hospital I spent 3 months living in at the age of 16. Silverman's was a clothing store near JC Penney's in Grand Forks. Highway 5 went by a community I was a school principal in. Overall the descriptions were very well done both of locations and characters.

Good

Narration was painfully slow, and at times the emotions were portrayed inaccurately by the narrator. The story itself was good, with classic novel elements like narrative tension and sub plot vs. over plot development done to an above-average level. Overall though, the characters largely lack depth and interest, especially in relation to the colorful and carefully-crafted plot.

Memorable

It's now been several months since I listened to The Round House with Gary Farmer as the narrator. The reading fit the book so well, that the two together - story and performance - make this something of importance.

The story has real characters caught in a terrible situation. Their reactions are perfectly real. The writing is insightful. The reading is wonderful. Having not grown up in the Northeast, it was a pleasure to have a slower story narration with the realistic intonation and accents of the characters. Since this book hinges on emotions, such a realistic reading was quite necessary and appreciated. I think there were a couple of mistakes, but nothing took away from the exploration of the character's thoughts, feelings and actions.

I don't think this book would have had the same impact on me if I had read it myself. That's saying something. With every other book through Audible, I have listened for convenience. That's what I expected for this book. However, that's not what I got. This is the only book after about a year on Audible (and purchased several beyond the ones that come with the subscription) with which the performance enhanced the story beyond expectation. I recommend listening to this version rather than purchasing the book and reading it yourself. If you want someone to read through a story quickly, almost like speed reading, then don't get this. If you want the true feel of the author's words, then purchase this and listen. You will not be disappointed.

abrupt ending?

the storyline and development of characters was great. the depth and understanding of how they felt, what they went through, was well written. only issue was the ending was extremely abrupt.

Justice

The narrator is a 13-year-old Ojibwe boy, Joe, pulling seedlings from around the foundation walls of his house with his father as they await his mother’s return from an errand. But, this is the day that his life will change forever. Yet, we hear the story completely from his perspective, with a certain amount of naivety and thinking that is limited by what he can understand, when a boy is no longer completely a boy but not yet a man. 

His mother is a tribal clerk, in Joe’s terms, a job that is "to know everybody's secrets," working with tribal records going back many generations. She had left to get some kind of file from her office, something that seems outside her normal practice. When her car turns into the driveway, she does not get out of the car but remains inside with her hand tightly clutching the steering wheel. When Joe’s father runs and opens the car door they find that she is bloody and strongly smells of gasoline. Joe doesn’t have the words to describe what he understands has happened but we find that she has been brutally raped and had only escaped as her rapist had trouble lighting the match after pouring gasoline over her. 

As the story progresses, the description from Joe’s perspective is perfect for such a novel. Joe is struggling to understand how such a thing could happen, how anyone could want to do such a thing, and why the process of finding and punishing the perpetrator is so slow and methodical. We often find Joe being shut out of things as adults try to protect him, starting at the hospital but continuing throughout. Joe is frustrated that he is kept out of the discussions. And, his mother has now confined herself in an upstairs room, refusing to eat and in an almost catatonic state. 

The irony is that Joe’s father is a highly respected tribal judge. For him, everything must be done in accord with the law. The problem is that she had been raped somewhere near a sacred round house (hence the book’s title) on reservation land, where tribal courts have jurisdiction. However, the actual location of the crime is uncertain. It may have happened on a strip of land that is a part of a state park where the state would hold authority or on another piece of land that had been sold by the tribe and is under a separate administration. And, when we finally get to a suspect, he is white. Tribal courts can’t prosecute non-­Native people. The judge handling the case is not certain whether the accused can be charged. 

That leaves Joe to pursue his own investigation in a manner that seems almost like a child’s detective novel, which makes sense since Joe is a child. And as the story develops, we find that it is not about rape at all. It is about the complexity of the legal system when it comes to Native Americans. It is about the struggle to understand the roots of criminal behavior. It is about a complexity of relationships that weave together to produce behavior that can only be understood after the fact. Joe is being introduced to the adult world while still having the understanding of a child.

Joe and his friends search for clues and try to find the culprit. Later they struggle with what to do when a suspect is found. And because this is told from the perspective of a 13-year-old boy and Native American, there is a lot of talk about sex in the manner of young boys as well as tribal traditions, dreams, and tales from elders. One in particular is of a “wiindigoo,” a person who is so possessed by a spirit that they "become an animal and see fellow humans as prey meat." Tribal tradition says that such a person must be killed. 

But, later we find that, though told from a boy’s perspective, it is being related by that boy after growing up and becoming, like his father, a tribal judge. 

This is not a book bashing non-natives for their treatment of Native-Americans. It comes across as just a story that lets the reader draw their own conclusions. My only warning is that it does have a lot of passages that sound just like two adolescent boys talking, coarse and unfiltered. And even the older generation comes across as pretty bawdy, no detailed descriptions, just a lot of talk. If that bothers you, this is not a book for you. However, you will miss a carefully crafted story.

Captivating

I really needed a book that would divert my attention from my current daily viligance. This book took me away in a story filled with surprise. Highly recommend it for readers who are looking for a true story that just can't be true but explores many truths.

Interesting book

The story was very well written, I felt like I was watching a movie through listening to the book it was easy to picture. The narrator was okay, his pauses were often a little too long

Heading out to buy the paperback...

Is there anything you would change about this book?

....so I can complete my consumption of this story, which is pretty good about a third of the way in.
It has my interest, but I have real real trouble with the narrator. It's not just his cadence, which some others have mentioned and is a *little* distracting, but his very strange choices of when to inject feeling and emphasis, which I ultimately found *too* distracting to continue listening.

Would you be willing to try another one of Gary Farmer’s performances?

Sorry, not a chance.

Great fiction & captures the reservation setting

I can't wait to read another Louise Erdrich book. Right up there with Sherman Alexie, Thomas King, and Tony Hillerman.

I was afraid this book would be too sad for me

I shy away from too much reality. I want entertainment. this book is very real and would be very sad if it weren't for Gary Farmer's narration. His voice carries comfort, compassion and humour.