Bullet Heart

The discovery of a pioneer graveyard containing the remains of both white settlers and those of a Sioux girl unleashes a struggle with profound repercussions over the remains that reveals the tortured history of the West and the realities and conflicts of reservation life.

Bitter legacies of Amerindian history erupt in tragic bloodshed at the center of this ambitious, transgenerational tale of adversity and renewal set in the reservation town of Choteau, S.D., from the early 1970s to the present. When golf course developers unearth a Lakota burial ground at the site of their 14th tee, they arouse anger on the adjacent reservation by relocating the graves of white settlers while shipping the bones of an Indian girl to the state capitol as relics--and by completing the course despite the probable presence of additional remains below. The powerlessness of Indian leaders to undo this injustice is the final insult to a community already shamefully exploited by its neighbors and living under humiliating conditions of poverty and debasement. After they steal back the bones, the men of Choteau begin arming themselves as they face increased harassment from authorities, hostile neighbors and other Indian factions. Doane ( City of Light ) chronicles the enusing conflict and its far-reaching consequences from the disparate perspectives of some dozen characters, captured in small, dramatic increments of first- and third-person narration. He writes incisively, subtly dramatizing cultural elements that shape Choteau's predicament. Jumping back and forth in time and juxtaposing varying attitudes and recollections, Doane creates a batch of vivid, painstakingly crafted puzzle pieces that on assembly yield a persuasive impression of the truth--both of history and of the lives of his memorable characters. BOMC alternate selection.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Doane (City of Light, 1992) uses a semisuccessful revolving narrative voice to relate the events following the discovery of a Native American's bones on the grounds of a South Dakota golf course in the early 1970s. When the state government appropriates the bones and refuses to return them, a group of Sioux begins stockpiling weapons at the Indian reservation in Choteau. The authorities eventually raid the cache, and Tyrone Little, an apparently Caucasian Vietnam veteran living on a farm outside of Choteau, is accused of having betrayed the rebels to the government. Tyrone and his lover, Delores Her Many Horses, a woman with a reputation who ``goes barefoot'' (doesn't use birth control), are at the center of the novel's nonpolitical story as well. Tyrone shoots another man, but the bullet passes through him and into Delores's womb, where it lodges in her fetus. Her son Joseph is born with a permanent scar on his chest, and many people ascribe his survival of that prenatal trauma to magical abilities they believe he still possesses. The many characters who speak their piece here make this a noisy novel, and Doane often has trouble differentiating their voices, even though each section begins with a name. (Some are in the first person and some in the third, but each gives a single character's point of view.) This blur of narrators is especially noticeable at crucial points in the plot--such as a shoot-out with federal agents--when the story is handed off rapidly from one character to the next. The longer chapters are more satisfying, and when he allows himself the space, Doane has a sharp method for bringing diverse parts together into a sinuous and surprising whole. Derring-do mixed with personal drama, sometimes bogged down by a crowded chorus. (Book-of-the-Month Club alternate selection) -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

In the reservation town of Choteaux, South Dakota, a pioneer graveyard is unearthed in the process of constructing a golf course. The bones of the whites are re-interred on sacred ground, but those of a Sioux girl are sent instead to the state house to be displayed as "artifacts." Thus commences the Bones War, dividing Native Americans among themselves and arousing the townspeople's hatred and fear of the Natives they continue to exploit. Their cause gives the Natives purpose, but events and their own ingrained sense of futility eventually wear them down. When a Native double agent shoots an FBI agent, conflict escalates into open war; the movement's leaders are eventually sent to jail for offenses they never committed. This powerful and affecting tale describes hypocrisy on a Pharisaical scale as it relentlessly details the crushing effects of bigotry, exploitation, and grinding poverty. Doane's sympathies are on the side of the Natives, but it is disturbingly clear that their fight has accomplished nothing. This exceptional, disturbingly honest novel depicts tragedy of a very high order. Highly recommended. [BOMC alternate selection.].-David Keymer, California State Univ., Stanislau.--.
David Keymer, California State Univ., Stanislaus
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

During the construction of a golf course near an Indian reservation in South Dakota, human remains are unearthed at the fourteenth hole, and so begin the Bone Wars of the 1970s. Most of the bones are European, with the exception of one skeleton of a young Native American girl. The white bones, being sacred, are relocated and given proper burial, but the Indian bones are considered artifacts, and the state takes possession of them. "The subject," according to Noah Lame, an Oglala Sioux debating taking up arms over the incident, "is how to resist becoming an artifact when you know you're a man." Doane does an extraordinary job of depicting the highly charged atmosphere of the ensuing struggle between an array of warring factions. He demonstrates the complexity of the situation and shows how it ultimately pits Indian against Indian and Indian against the FBI, the Bureau of Indian Affairs, and the whites. Doane effectively captures, occasionally with haunting insight, more than a dozen voices and relates how a community with intricate and indelible ties based on blood, land, age, and heritage erupts into chaos and violence. Benjamin Segedin