American Indian Culture and Research Journal

Readers will remember the pitch-perfect opening of Louise Erdrich’s revolutionary first novel, Love Medicine, when June Kashpaw wanders off to die in the barren fields outside Williston, North Dakota. The book begins with Kashpaw on her way to the bus station in Williston, intent on heading home, only to be seduced, if that’s the right word, by a “mud engineer” named Andy. They drink, eat Easter eggs together at the bar, and later have a sexual fumble in his Silverado pickup truck before he passes out and she decides to walk home clear across the state of North Dakota wearing nothing but a windbreaker, slacks, and high-heel shoes. The whole opening focuses very closely on June’s body and the way she moves, “like a young girl on slim hard legs”; on the Rigger bar in which she meets her paramour; and on the weather, which is overcast (but warm) for Easter weekend—all in all, on the tactile qualities of the stage set. The third- person voice, which will be abandoned for the most part in the rest of the novel in favor of revolving first-person narrators, is unhurried. The voice is patient, in control; the narrative eye wanders, but never very far past the surface. Only on page 4 does the voice veer toward the meaningful: “Ahhhhh,” she said, surprised, almost in pain, “you got to be.” “I got to be what, honeysuckle?” He tightened his arm around her slim shoulders. They were sitting in a booth with a few others, drinking Angel Wings. Her mouth, the lipstick darkly blurred now, tipped unevenly toward his. “You got to be different.” (4)