The Mighty Red: A Novel
A FINALIST FOR THE KIRKUS PRIZE FOR FICTION
In this stunning novel, Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award–winning author Louise Erdrich tells a story of love, natural forces, spiritual yearnings, and the tragic impact of uncontrollable circumstances on ordinary people’s lives.
History is a flood. The mighty red . . .
In Argus, North Dakota, a collection of people revolve around a fraught wedding.
Gary Geist, a terrified young man set to inherit two farms, is desperate to marry Kismet Poe, an impulsive, lapsed Goth who can't read her future but seems to resolve his.
Hugo, a gentle red-haired, home-schooled giant, is also in love with Kismet. He’s determined to steal her and is eager to be a home wrecker.
Kismet's mother, Crystal, hauls sugar beets for Gary's family, and on her nightly runs, tunes into the darkness of late-night radio, sees visions of guardian angels, and worries for the future, her daughter’s and her own.
Human time, deep time, Red River time, the half-life of herbicides and pesticides, and the elegance of time represented in fracking core samples from unimaginable depths, is set against the speed of climate change, the depletion of natural resources, and the sudden economic meltdown of 2008-2009. How much does a dress cost? A used car? A package of cinnamon rolls? Can you see the shape of your soul in the everchanging clouds? Your personal salvation in the giant expanse of sky? These are the questions the people of the Red River Valley of the North wrestle with every day.
The Mighty Red is a novel of tender humor, disturbance, and hallucinatory mourning. It is about on-the-job pains and immeasurable satisfactions, a turbulent landscape, and eating the native weeds growing in your backyard. It is about ordinary people who dream, grow up, fall in love, struggle, endure tragedy, carry bitter secrets; men and women both complicated and contradictory, flawed and decent, lonely and hopeful. It is about a starkly beautiful prairie community whose members must cope with devastating consequences as powerful forces upend them. As with every book this great modern master writes, The Mighty Red is about our tattered bond with the earth, and about love in all of its absurdity and splendor.
A new novel by Louise Erdrich is a major literary event; gorgeous and heartrending, The Mighty Red is a triumph.
Book At A Glance
# of Pages: 384
Book Binding: Hardcover
Year of Publication: 2024
Publisher: Harper
Language: en
ISBN: 9780063277052
Creator Bio
Louise Erdrich is a celebrated American author of Native American descent, known for her powerful and lyrical writing style. Born in Little Falls, Minnesota in 1954, Erdrich grew up in a family of storytellers and was heavily influenced by her Native American heritage. She attended Dartmouth College and Johns Hopkins University, where she studied poetry and writing. Erdrich's literary career began in 1984 with the publication of her first novel, Love Medicine, which received critical acclaim and established her as a major voice in contemporary literature. Since then, she has written numerous award-winning novels, including The Round House, which won the National Book Award for Fiction. Erdrich continues to write and publish, and her works often explore the complexities of Native American identity and the legacy of colonization in the United States.
