by Kent Nerburn
First published 2009
Kent Nerburn discovers a note on his windshield that pulls him back to the Lakota reservation. More than ten years have passed since he first traveled these lands with Dan, a tribal elder whose old dog has just died. The two men set out across the northern High Plains on a journey that takes them deep into Dakota hill country. Dan leads Nerburn to remote Native homesteads and into the suffocating darkness of sweat lodges. They explore the painful legacy of reservation boarding schools that shaped generations of Native children. Throughout their travels, Dan searches for childhood ghosts that have never left him alone. Nerburn learns how Native Americans pass down knowledge and wisdom through experience rather than explanation. The journey becomes both teacher and lesson as the vast landscape of the northern plains reveals its secrets. Dan's quest to confront his past becomes Nerburn's education in a way of seeing the world that few outsiders ever understand.
Genres: literary-fiction, historical-fiction, biography-memoir, native-american
Vibes: atmospheric, intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: found-family, journey
Setting: Lakota Reservation, Dakota Hill Country
Period: 20th-century
368 pages · Paperback · New World Library
Content warnings: mental-illness