Last Report on the Miracle at Little No Horse, Louise Erdrich
  Last viewed: Dec 09, 2009, 06:12:01 AM (GMT)

Winnemucca, NV--The thing that gets you about Louise E., not only can she write, she can tell a hell of a story.

I mostly favor writers who are writers, and turned up my nose a few times at all the storytelling: opening teases, building suspense, plot twists--all that hackneyed stuff. Yet it all mostly works AND there's no denying the writing.

Erdrich sails unstrained through these mazes of character, plot, subplot, family relationships spanning generations and multiple volumes (her "Yoknapatawpha"). This is kind of tangential, but then there are all the babies, and Birchbark Books (!) and you try to reconcile it all with this kind of apologetic-looking half-Ojibwe gal on the dustjacket and just end up thinking... well, speaking only for myself here, I was thinking kind of around in circles, "Braininess and zaniness, brawny brains and crazy zaniness... sigh...! braininess and zaniness..."

What means I by writing? Well, there are the phrases that jump off the page, right into you, maybe forever, that bear repeating or alluding to, initially with full credit, later, eroded past Erdrich-worthiness, justly without. "His complex German gloom" was one that got me. But that's not really writing, just poetry. And not even a good example, just what came first to mind.

Then you have people you don't like to think of as characters, having met them. Substantial people, odd people, memorable and idiosyncratic people preposterous beyond measure were they not conflicted and utterly reliable. You take this sense of them and find it holding up through what you could never have imagined becoming of them.

Still, what I mostly mean by "the writing" is, I don't know, I'll try to say it, this encroachment of expression upon thought (yeah... Lou Reed quoting ?) that just seems miraculous, godlike. To a skull-dunce hickboy like me, I mean.

And the rhythm, so gracious. How can you get through a book without ever having to read a sentence twice? No wait, I'm hyperventilating. There was an awkward sentence, toward the end, and one typo I remember seeing. Probably intentional, to vent the evil spirits out. Like that absolutely embarrassing afterword part with the letter about some writer named Erdrich breaking with the sanctity of the confessional. E-gad!

I'm glad I finally had a chance to dig into Report; a little more daunting than earlier Erdrich. I was right in step when Love Medicine broke through like a ton of butter on a hot day. Next I read Tracks and felt myself in the presence of mystical intelligence, almost like Emily Dickinson or something, whose Complete Poems I still hazard the odd bibliomancy with. The Beat Queen, it took me two tries, then it was only great. The less said about Crown of Columbus--but that's surely just jealousy of co-author/husband--I probably didn't give it fair trial.

So... why yes, I did like Report. It's a girly book, highly religious, with a few kneeslappers, floods and shoot-em-ups. I'd recommend it sometime when you have an uninterrupted day and a half free. Reading Erdrich fast helps you keep the details straight, unless you have an exceptional memory (I certainly do not). And I wouldn't worry too much about rushing it. You'll have plenty of time to enjoy it afterward.

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