Review: Louise Erdrich weaves complex Indian story in 'LaRose'

Perhaps the most important of Erdrich’s achievements is her mastery of complex forms. Her novels are multivocal, and she uses this multiplicity to build a nest, capacious, sturdy and resplendent, for her tales of Indians, living and dead, of the burden and power of their heritage, the challenge and comedy of the present’s harsh demands. Woven into the specificity of these narratives is Erdrich’s determination to speak of the most pressing human questions. In the case of her latest novel, “LaRose,” that question is deceptively simple: Can a person “do the worst thing possible and still be loved”?

A man named Landreaux has done the worst thing possible. Hunting a buck, he has accidentally killed the child of his best friend. Faced with an unbearable burden of anguish, loss and guilt, he looks to his Indian forebears’ wisdom and decides that he will give his own son, LaRose, to the parents of the dead child. But it is the advent of the 21st century, and the dead boy lived not on the reservation but just outside its boundary.

The 5-year-old exchanged boy, LaRose, was named for his ancestors, who were known for their gifts of healing, and we begin to learn the story of the first LaRose soon after we are told the details of the exchange. We go back to 1839 and see that LaRose as a young girl, watch her play a part in the murder of the man who raped her, rejoice in her romance and marriage, witness her death and the theft of her remains by white “scientists.” With a touch so light as to be almost casual, Erdrich includes details of Indian history that force the reader to acknowledge the damage that has extended through generations. For those of us who love “The Wizard of Oz,” it’s a shock to read the words L. Frank Baum wrote in a newspaper article in the late 19th century arguing that “our only safety depends upon the total extermination of the Indians.”