Last Standing Woman

I bought this book while on a tour in North Dakota. Something about the title drew my attention and I have been completely satisfied with my purchase. As one reviewer noted, this is not a book for anyone looking for a romanticized depiction of Indian people nor a "how-to" book for those looking for more info on Indian spirituality. It is an engrossing character study of many fictional Indian people who live their lives in the Minnesota woodlands from the early 1800's to the present. Their struggles, triumphs, sorrows and joys are presented in a highly readable prose. I am hoping Ms. LaDuke continues to write fiction that portrays a segment of our American population which has been woefully neglected.

I loved this richly told story of Woodland indigenous history. LaDuke's prose is so evocative, reading it feels like sitting on the shores of Round Lake listening to the loons or canoeing through the rice fields at the edges of Gull Lake startling the Great Blue Herons and seeing Ojibwe history unfold out of the early morning mist. Winona captures the essence of the lakes and forests of Northern Minnesota and brings to life the tragedies and joys of the Anishinaabe people through generations of survival through all the vagaries of the seasons and the challenges that history forced upon them. A beautiful book with charming pictographs. The original hardcover had a beautiful cover painting by Artist Jeffrey Chapman. Highly recommended.

I spied this book in San Francisco last year while on holiday from England. I rarely read fiction, but this was absolutely great. There are few books that I am unable to put down once started but this was one. From beginning to end I was wrapped in the humour, tragedy and triumph of this novel. Some great characterizations, I became especially fond of Kway Dole. A great book for anyone interested in the whole diversity of Native American experiences, but not for new-agers looking to find a deceased Medicine Man as a spirit guide!!!

See above. Its a shame that more "fiction" doesn't come across as "real."

LaDuke, who has run twice (in 1996 and 2000) for Vice-President on the Association of State Green Parties ticket with Ralph Nader for President, is arguably the most important woman in North America. She often shows up in short lists of "Leaders of the Future", certainly "on the left", but yet she lives quietly on a reserve in Minnesota, and does not campaign even when she's running for Vice-President. What is going on here? Who is she?LaDuke's novel says it all. It bares the roots of five hundred years of rather incredible history, the conflicts between cultures and peoples, the imposition of an extremely violent system of governance and retributive justice for property crime, the denigration of native peoples, application of "terra nullius", breaking of treaties, and the whole legalist campaign that put British descendants in firm control of North America.Feminine, aboriginal, and ecological values are barely visible at the surface of this novel - there are no explicit treatises, no ideological passages. This is not "Atlas Shrugged for Greens" - you will not be sold a Green Party Card by this book. Nor is it the romanticized "Dances With Wolves" - you will not see the lives of the many diverse human beings of the native tribes of this small patch of North America as some kind of mystical journey. You will read real stories of each generation.You will be brought up to the present.This is the history book you were not given in school. You were, instead, taught something about military glory and how "proper" courts and "real" justice now prevail in North America west of the Mississipi River. You were taught nonsense.You have a chance to learn the truth from a masterful author. If she someday becomes your President, and I can only hope that she will, you will understand why, and you will see why this is a necessary evolution. Women, Natives, Ecology still sound like special interest groups today. LaDuke's beautiful storytelling and poignant moments of misery and remnant pride will demonstrate better than any political speech, why they are not, and why there can be no future other than that which elevates the feminine, the aboriginal, the ecological, to their right precedence over the masculine, the colonial, and the industrial.It is time to abandon the tribes you came with, and choose new ones. Let this book be your entry point. You will not regret it.