Books : The Plague of Doves: A Novel

Rating: - Disjointed, but still Pretty Good
It's been some years since I last read a book by Louise Erdrich. She is a fine writer, and despite my hiatus, Plague felt comfortably familiar. Erdrich is sort of a Native American Toni Morrison. Well-turned phrases, interesting and touching vignettes, and a touch of comedy keep me coming back for more, but I sometimes feel that there is a layer to her narratives which is just outside my reach (I feel that way with Toni Morrison too; maybe I'm not clever enough to be reading these books). The stories were somewhat disjointed, reflecting the nature of their previous incarnations in literary-style magazines.

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Rating: - The interconnectedness of everything
THE PLAGUE OF DOVES was stitched together from a number of short stories, many of them previously published in "The New Yorker". There is a bit of disjointedness, but it is remarakable how well the patchwork comes together to make a whole, integral quilt (a metaphor that I see has occurred to other reviewers as well).

The novel covers a century of life in North Dakota, focusing on the lives of several Ojibwe Indian families and the Europeans who interact and intermarry with them. The central event is the murder, in 1911, of a farm family (save for an infant daughter who is overlooked and reappears near the end of the book), and the subsequent lynching of three Indians, rashly and wrongly accused of the murders (though sparing a fourth Indian, who, much later in life, is a central figure in the narrative). "The Plague of Doves" is the story that opens the book, and it features an almost surreal scene (I think of Ingmar Bergman) in which the inhabitants of rural North Dakota go forth from the Catholic Church, led by a priest with a makeshift censer, into the fields to beat and shoo away hordes of doves -- or, apparently, passenger pigeons -- which cover the terrain. But throughout the novel there is a lot of dove-like beating of wings in people's souls and bodies, and there are several references to the dove as the incarnation of the Holy Spirit and there is a sense in which some of the characters' anxieties can be traced to a little too much religious fervor.

Typical, perhaps, of a small town on the high plains, everyone seems to be related somehow to someone else and to some of the legendary or mythical events of the past, especially the 1911 murders and lynchings. As Judge Coutts says, "Nothing that happens, nothing, is not connected here by blood."

Throughout, there are numerous references to the life of the contemporary Indian (specifically, the Ojibwe), but in a casual, off-hand manner, without ever even beginning to coalesce into a screed or polemic. Rather than the plight of Native Americans, the novel is more about various aspects of the plight of human beings. And the subsurface message is that humans come and go in the continuous transformation of the universe. Indeed, entire towns and peoples come and go.

In addition to moments of tragedy and human cruelty, there are also moments of love and episodes of high hilarity. Indeed, THE PLAGUE OF DOVES is narrated, for the most part, in voices (there are four different narrators) of love and good humor. The novel is not uniform in quality, and it is not a "great" novel, but it is quite well-done and well worth reading. It was the first of Louise Erdrich's novels that I read, and I will make a point to read more of her work.

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Rating: - Plague of Doves
Louise Erdrich writes complex, fascinating novels. Plague of Doves continues her tradition by focusing on the murder of a farm family a few generations earlier in North Dakota. As in the author's previous tales, plots weave in and out to form a tapestry, this time, of intermarriage between Ojibwe and white, false accusations, family truths which are only true for them, historical injustice, love, and lies.

The narrators are Evalina Harp, Marn Wolde, Judge Antone Bazil Coutts and Doctor Cordelia Lochren. Evalina tells of her Grandfather Mooshum's recollection of his first encounter with his wife... "'And there she was!' Mooshum paused in his story. His hands opened and the hundreds of wrinkles in his face folded into a mask of unsurpassable happiness." He goes on to describe how they both were young teens attempting to scare away the thousands of doves invading their fields. The couple ran and didn't look back. But they do come back and play a major role in the tale.

The narrators tell their stories; however, the tapestry remains unfinished, waiting for the next generation to weave their own pattern. We, the readers, know some truths before the inhabitants of the story. Stamps, violins, and a hanging tree all play small, yet important parts.

Erdrich is a master. As the tale unfolds, she draws us into the compelling community that on the surface is ordinary and mundane, and underneath is full of the high drama of humanity. She excels at portraying people, people most of us would never meet, yet people who will remain in our consciousness.

by Judith Helburn
for Story Circle Book Reviews
reviewing books by, for, and about women

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Rating: - A Satisfying Read
I am a big fan of Louise Erdrich and have read most of her books. 'Plague of Doves' may not quite be her best, which I still think is 'Love Medecine' (which I totally recommend) but it's a very satisfying read if you like big novels with interlocking stories. 'Plague of Doves' is almost like 'The Hours' in the way that it interweaves plots from various timeframes and draws parallels between past and present events-although Erdrich's book has the advantage of also being a pretty good, suspenseful murder mystery. I found Erdrich's evocation of the historical setting of the Dakota Territory circa 1910 to be totally convincing and could easily picture this book as a TV mini-series. The best sections, though, are the ones that deal with everyday reservation life in the 1970s, which seemed to me completely convincing. There are lots of good, well-drawn characters here that you can identify with, especially Evelina, who narrates long portions of the book. In the end, I found the resolution of the murder slightly anti-climactic and really enjoyed the book most for its compelling sense of place and for all the small narratives interspersed throughout. All in all, a really good book to pack in your carry-on bag during a long vacation-which is how I read it!

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Rating: - Disappointing
This was the first book I read of this author, and although I persevered through it, when I reached the end, I decided it was rather a waste of time. I couldn't remember who was related to whom, and why I should care. True, some of the writing was quite lyrical--maybe that's why I finished the book--but when I got to the end, I had to go back and figure out why the murder had been committed in the first place. I really couldn't relate to any of the characters, particularly, although I was moved by the tragedy of the lynching. Otherwise, Erdich's violin and all the music around it fell into a black hole for me. I wouldn't recommend this book.