The Jailing of Cecelia Capture [Paperback]

Janet Campbell Hale (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 1, 1987

Cecelia Capture Welles, an Indian law student and mother of two, is jailed on her thirtieth birthday for drunk driving. Held on an old welfare fraud charge, she reflects back on her life on the reservation in Idaho, her days as an unwed mother in San Francisco, her marriage to a white liberal, and her decision to return to college. This mixed inheritance of ambition and despair brings her to the brink of suicide.

"The Jailing of Cecelia Capture is a beautifully written book. Janet Campbell Hale's gifts are genuine and deeply felt."--Toni Morrison"

Editorial Reviews

Review

On the day after her thirtieth birthday, Cecelia Capture, a mixed-blood Native American law student, wakes up in a holding tank in the Berkeley jail. Booked on a drunk driving charge, she begins to contemplate her life through a series of flashbacks. Her search for identity goes back to the Idaho reservation where she was raised by an alcoholic fullblood father and a crazy half-breed mother. As she reflects on the various phases of her life, including a bittersweet romance with a soldier just leaving for Vietnam who becomes the father of her son, and her loveless marriage to a white liberal teacher, she begins to see patterns in the apparent meaninglessness of her life. Despite pain and setback, Cecelia is a survivor, and her Native American identity gives meaning and purpose to her life. She comes close to suicide, but her vision of what she can be for her people and herself carries her on. "She was not able to return to the beginning, of course, and remake her life more to her liking, but now she was free to go on with the life she did have." The author, a member of the Coeur d'Alene tribe, writes in a calm and dispassionate voice with real understanding of how it feels and what it means to be Native American today. To reach Cecelia's point of self-identity, to really like oneself, requires an often painful self-examination, a process that Janet Campbell Hale explores brilliantly in this book. -- For great reviews of books for girls, check out Let's Hear It for the Girls: 375 Great Books for Readers 2-14. -- From 500 Great Books by Women; review by Nancy Maryboy

From the Inside Flap

A novel of urban Indian life.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: University of New Mexico Press (July 1, 1987)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0826310036
• ISBN-13: 978-0826310033
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #388,271 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Identity in American Society, April 22, 2002

By 

Psyche Eagleshadow (Tucson, AZ United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Jailing of Cecelia Capture (Paperback)

The Jailing of Cecilia Capture is a well-written novel that addresses the themes of home, purpose, family, struggles, and foremost identity. Hale writes the story without distracting the reader with anything that isn't needed. Of primary interest to native american readers, such as myself, this work looks at a character, who like so many of us, is trying to balance the past with the present, being native with trying to make a living in American society. The way Cecilia Capture stumbles through her identity and difficulties, and somehow manages a precarious balance that works is a valuable lesson in "seeking life". I highly recommend this book to native readers, and to non-Indians who wish to get a glimpse of some of the challenges we natives are faced with. It is also a book with a great independent woman character, who is portrayed in a realistic and appreciable way.