The Mighty Red
On sale
30th September 2024
Price: £20
‘Erdrich remains one of the world’s literary giants’ Boston Globe
In Argus, North Dakota, a fraught wedding is taking place.
Gary Geist, a terrified young man set to inherit two farms, is desperate to marry Kismet Poe. Gary thinks Kismet is the answer to all of his problems; Kismet can’t even imagine her future, let alone the kind of future Gary might offer. During a clumsy proposal, Kismet misses her chance to say ‘no’ and so the die is cast.
Hugo has been in love with Kismet for years. He has been her friend, confidante and occasionally her lover – and now she is marrying Gary, Hugo is determined to steal her back.
Meanwhile Kismet’s mother, Crystal, hauls sugar beets for Gary’s family, and on her nightly truck drives along the highway from the farm to the factories, she tunes in to the darkness of late-night radio, sees visions of guardian angels, and worries for the future – both her daughter’s and her own.
Starkly beautiful like the landscape it inhabits, The Mighty Red is about ordinary people who dream, grow up, fall in love, struggle, endure tragedy, carry bitter secrets. And as with every book this great modern master writes, The Mighty Red is about our tattered bond with the earth, and about love in all of its absurdity and splendour.
A new novel by Louise Erdrich is a major literary event; gorgeous and heartrending, The Mighty Red is a triumph.
In Argus, North Dakota, a fraught wedding is taking place.
Gary Geist, a terrified young man set to inherit two farms, is desperate to marry Kismet Poe. Gary thinks Kismet is the answer to all of his problems; Kismet can’t even imagine her future, let alone the kind of future Gary might offer. During a clumsy proposal, Kismet misses her chance to say ‘no’ and so the die is cast.
Hugo has been in love with Kismet for years. He has been her friend, confidante and occasionally her lover – and now she is marrying Gary, Hugo is determined to steal her back.
Meanwhile Kismet’s mother, Crystal, hauls sugar beets for Gary’s family, and on her nightly truck drives along the highway from the farm to the factories, she tunes in to the darkness of late-night radio, sees visions of guardian angels, and worries for the future – both her daughter’s and her own.
Starkly beautiful like the landscape it inhabits, The Mighty Red is about ordinary people who dream, grow up, fall in love, struggle, endure tragedy, carry bitter secrets. And as with every book this great modern master writes, The Mighty Red is about our tattered bond with the earth, and about love in all of its absurdity and splendour.
A new novel by Louise Erdrich is a major literary event; gorgeous and heartrending, The Mighty Red is a triumph.
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Reviews
In The Mighty Red, humor and sorrow are fused together like twined tree trunks that keep each other standing.... Erdrich is so good at romantic comedy, with her special blend of Austen sense and Ojibwe sensibility. As the funny scenes flow one after another, you may not even notice the stray drops of blood scattered along the novel's margins. . . . As usual when closing a book by Louise Erdrich, I'm left wondering, how can a novel be so funny and so moving? How can life?
A sweeping, tender-hearted epic
Erdrich's achievement is pretty remarkable: a [narrative] voice with brio and lightness that wends and weaves between modes and moods. It's unpredictable and multifaceted
Erdrich remains one of the world's literary giants
An immersive domestic drama . . . that, like much of Erdrich's oeuvre, speaks to the acrimony at the heart of the American national project
A new novel from Louise Erdrich-winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award, if you didn't know-is always something to celebrate... Start clearing off space on your bedside table now
[A] finely woven tale of anguish and desire, crimes and healing. With irresistible characters, dramatic predicaments, crisp wit, gorgeously rendered settings, striking ecological facts, and a cosmic dimension, Erdrich's latest tale of the plains reverberates with arresting revelations
A heart-wrenching story of how human lives are susceptible to nature's impact
Erdrich remains one of the world's literary giants
'Erdrich excels at the slow simmer, and once again she delivers a deliciously seductive masterwork'
[A] deft, almost winsome novel. . . . Erdrich's writing feels both effortless and wise. . . . In this tender and capacious story, love and tragedy mingle along the river and into the world
In the hands of this master storyteller, everything is effortlessly connected. . . . Fearlessly depicting the toughest losses and darkest threats, Erdrich always finds hope
The Mighty Red might just be a new American classic