Synopsis
Lilli Chischilly's world is one in which she is continually seeking the spiritual balance at the heart of her culture; she stands with one foot firmly planted in the world of the Dine'é, her Navajo People, and the other in the white world of the Bilagáana, where her legal skills and deep understanding of both cultures have put her in the political spotlight. But to Lilli everything seems to be about agendas and everyone appears to want something from her. Her boss at the Navajo Nation's Historic Preservation Department sends her down the river, literally, with the front running candidate for the presidency of the United States, a man with a less than surprising agenda of his own. And what sort of agenda does Jerome Bah have? Lilli's childhood best friend has recently returned to the reservation and is trying to tell her something through his haunting aerial photographs. Even the most ancient and revered Navajo healer wants something from Lilli, but just what that something might be is not yet clear. Darker forces are at work here as well. A murdered Navajo grandfather, symbolically marked, is found in the strange landscape of the hoodoos, and someone is determined that a Mormon man named Lee will never be the American president. It is up to Lilli to find her way to the center of this labyrinth as the mighty Colorado carries a raft full of people toward the unknown and the unexpected. This stunning debut novel will carry the reader on an intriguing journey through Navajo mysticism, political manipulation and a twisted mind obsessed with an historical event that could reach out from the past to change the future.
Reviews
Like the river that drives much of its plot, this debut novel runs smooth and fast, with the occasional turbulent rapids and a few circling eddies. Lilli Chischilly is a lawyer for the Navajo Nation who finds herself at the center of several dramas-the murder of a Navajo elder, the return of her childhood love, and the collision of a presidential campaign with a reservation community. Chischilly embarks on a symbolic river trip with presidential candidate Lee, his family and handlers, and her old flame Jerome. Stacked with dramatic tension, including Chischilly's doubts over the candidate's intentions towards her people anda would-be assassin with a score to settle against Lee, Kitchell's narrative can be awkward in its transitions, reintroducing lost plotlines abruptly. Still, the whole of the novel is tied together well by the Navajo perspective, presented with a matter-of-factness and lightness of touch that make it hard to believe that Kitchell, a geologist, isn't a Navajo herself; for that alone, she proves herself a new talent worth watching.
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