The Round House by Louise Erdrich

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 thirteen-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.

This book is among one of the worst books I've ever read.  I am seriously starting to wonder about award winning books.  Does it have to suck to win an award?

 

The Round House is what I call a "boy book."  You know those books that are about boys and probably only appeal to boys (like A Separate Peace).  But the big issue is what boy would want to read about how another boy deals with his mother being raped?  So it fails even that criteria (yes it is my own but I have to have some criteria's).

 

Louise Erdrich did something rather unusual in her writing style, she used absolutely no quotations.  A number of times I had to read read sections to figure out what was actually being spoken out loud by the character, what was internal thought and what was just descriptions.  It was really annoying.  It broke up the pace (not that she had an edge of your seat pace, which a mystery book in my opinion should have).

 

None of the characters seem to have any redeeming qualities.  Again I feel like another author tried to make their characters more realistic by giving them flaws but went overboard.  The Catholic Priest in this book is particularly scummy, come on people stop picking on the Catholic's they are not all bad. 

 

As I'm sure you can tell from my tone I am absolutely disgusted with having made myself read this entire book and am loosing faith in the literary world.  I am ready to go back to my mind numbing teen vampires!

 

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