LaRose by Louise Erdrich (2016)

I have always considered Louise Erdrich to be greatly overrated as a writer, even though in the past she has won both the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award. This novel also won the NBCC, is a finalist for the Pen/Faulkner Award, to be announced April 4, and is considered to be a top contender for the Pulitzer Prize, to be announced April 10. So even though I had not planned to read LaRose, I decided to give Erdrich another chance to impress me.

The book begins dramatically with a death. While stalking a deer, Landreaux Iron accidentally shoots and kills the 5-year-old son of his best friend and neighbor, Pete Ravich. While the Ravich family is consumed by unimaginable grief, Landreaux suffers from unrelenting guilt and turns to his Ojibwe heritage to seek guidance in a sweat lodge. In a reversion to old traditions, he and his wife give their own 5-year-old son LaRose to the Ravich family, saying, "Our son will be your son." So begins a story of the hard process of healing and forgiveness.

In addition to the core plot, Erdrich includes stories of LaRose's like-named ancestors, the troubles of a conflicted priest, and the revengeful plans of a drug-addled man with a longstanding grudge.

I am still not impressed with Erdrich. It's not that she is incompetent as a writer or that her basic story is not intriguing. I just find her books, including this one, to be lacking in that special quality that would make them exceptional. They are not memorable. They lack focus. They include extraneous side plots with only tenuous connections to the core stories. They most always include a touch of Native American mysticism, which seems to me to be thrown unnecessarily into the mix for the purpose of enhancing her credibility as a chronicler of modern Native American life rather than for plot advancement.

I am sure most readers will enjoy reading LaRose, as I did, but I would classify her books as popular fiction rather than as literary fiction. I am continually surprised when she wins awards.