The Antelope Wife

Past and present combine in a contemporary tale of love and betrayal influenced by Chippewa tradition, myth and legend. ‘Everything is all knotted up in a tangle. Pull one string of this family and the whole web will tremble.’ Rozin and Richard, living in Minneapolis with their two young daughters, seem a long way from the traditions of their Native American ancestors. But when one of their acquaintances kidnaps a strange and silent young woman from a Native American camp and brings her back to live with him as his wife, the connections they all hold to the past rear up to confront them. Soon the patterns of their ancestors begin to repeat themselves with truly tragic consequences. No one is better placed than Louise Erdrich to chronicle the Native American experience, and in ‘The Antelope Wife,, she has created an utterly compelling portrait of three generations of one family, who are more closely linked than they could ever imagine. Shrouded in myth and steeped in imagery, this is also a tale of heartbreaking realism which manages to retain a warm and irrepressible humour and belief in the resilience of the human spirit.