Cracking Crime: The Round House by Louise Erdrich

The Round House by Louise Erdrich

A deeply humane and moving tale set in an American Indian Reservation.

About the Book

One Sunday in 1988, thirteen-year-old Joe Coutts learns that his mother has been the victim of a brutal attack by a man on their North Dakota reservation. Joe’s mother is traumatized and afraid. She takes to her bed, and refuses to talk to anyone – including the police; meanwhile his father, a tribal judge, endeavours to wrest justice from a situation that defies his keenest efforts; and young Joe’s moral and emotional landscape shifts on its child’s axis.

Frustrated, confused and nursing a complicated fury, Joe sets out with his best friends Cappy, Zack and Angus in search of answers that might put his mother’s attacker behind bars – and set his family’s world straight again. Or so he hopes. The Round House is a powerful and deeply humane story of a young boy pitched prematurely into an unjust adult world.

It’s Dead Good because…

The Round House not only offers a fascinating insight into the tribal laws within reservations in America in the 80’s but also the cultural and emotional family ties that are impacted by crime. Told from the perspective of 13 year old Joe, who you can’t help but warm too, this book illustrates that when an adults hands are tied sometimes the children feel forced to act.

A cross between Stand By Me and A Time to Kill, Louise Erdrich’s novel is simply brilliant and hugely moving.

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