Customer Reviews

Listening Woman

5 star:		(26)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The first half of Listening Woman, the third in the Joe Leaphorn series, is vintage Hillerman. There's lots of desert scenery and insights into Native American life. Unlike other books, this book is focused entirely within the Navajoes but even then we learn that there are 58 clans, 57 who keep Navajo time and then this clan that's slow even by Navajo standards. Of course, much of the mystery takes place on their turf.

Joe is investigating a variety of backburner cases as an excuse to be in an area where a motorist had nearly hit him. As he digs deeper, a missing helicopter and an FBI investigation seem to be involved in whatever is going on. Enter the Dirk Pitt side of Joe's personality. I won't spoil the surprise but suffice it to say that Joe endures flame, flood and a host of other harrowing experiences as he solves the crime and saves the day.

Bottom line: Less religion and culture, more action than the other Hillerman's I've read. Still, a fun, entertaining read.

There are few things as satisfying in the modern mystery novel as looking into the methodical mind of Detective Joe Leaphorn. While many people read Tony Hillerman for his insights into Navajo culture, I most enjoy his depiction of the always thoughtful Leaphorn.

In Listening Woman, Leaphorn faces his usual intertangled mess of events: being nearly run over by a maniac, the theft of a helicopter, and two unsolved deaths in a remote corner of the reservation. The joy of this book is its window into Leaphorn's mind as he tries to make sense of seemingly random events.

Hillerman's myteries are enjoyable because he keeps the details in front of the reader. His detectives express bafflement, hold erroneous assumptions, and are very much prone to mistaken judgement. As such, they are real and believable.

Listening Woman features a remarkable and intense closing sequence, which I have no intention of ruining. This is one of Hillerman's best novels and I heartily recommend it.

I love this book, not only was it a good punchy action/mystery novel - with more action in it than I had previously encountered in Leaphorn books. But I was also intrigued by the underlying messages in it - the complex nature of culture and change and adaptation which the mystery based itself on.

Hostein Tso is troubled and calls Listening Woman and her assistant to his hogan for a song - however, he won't tell listening woman everything she needs to know - he is concealing a secret of his great-grandfather and cannot tell. While she is away in a trance, her assistant and Hostein Tso are murdered.

This is just one of a series of crimes in the reservation which are troubling Leaphorn. There is the missing helicopter which was last seen in the area, a man with gold-rimmed glasses who has tried to run Leaphorn down, a large vicious dog, a lost woman, a catholic priest and a group of boy scouts. And all the problems seem to connect at Hostein Tso's hogan.

This is an intriguing and complex mystery which I enjoyed. The threads do not tie easily together until almost the very last. There is also a good deal more action. Leaphorn is forced to do some fairly hairy things to keep alive - including caving and surviving a brush fire. These aren't always quite believeable - especially in the aftermath where he doesn't seem to suffer much from the after-effects.

What I loved about this book best was the underlying themes which blended Navajo ways and traditions with those of the white people. Not everything came out well, but they weren't judged for it. The ability of the Navajo to adapt their traditions, were contrasted with those who attempted to find a new way. The really interesting one was the mention of the two brothers in traditional legend and the paths they took - which contrasted with the two brothers in this who both chose different paths.

Really good read, and a thoughtful message to it.

This early Leapthorn novel must have passed me by before now. Later novels, both with Leapthorn and Chee, tend to emphasize the problems of dual cultures, but Leapthorn here is Navajo first, cop second. Since the case is about the alleged desecration of a ritual site, Joe interviews a traditional medicine woman attending ceremonial gathering. I enjoyed a glimpse of these rites as much as the solution to a cracking mystery involving Native American activists, straying Catholic priests and kidnapped Boy Scouts.

If you are looking for an exciting read, stop right here because the Listening Woman is it! From the opening chapter to the astounding ending, each page is entertaining. More than a mystery where the reader can gage the facts in order to learn the many answers, one must become involved in the heart and customs of the Navajo if you are to hope to solve this tale before the end.

In The Listening Woman the reader becomes a part of the action. This is largely due to the awesome descriptions of the land and the people, along with the situations which keep you on the edge of your seat! The characters come to life and the empathetic reader will cry and laugh with them. You will also feel the fear of being pursued by an unbelivable beast and the dark terror of being trapped with little hope of escape.

A word of warning - you may need to set aside a few hours to read this book because it will be difficult to put down!

This is generally a wonderful book, with a memorable opening scene, an intriguing set of characters, and a magnificent (and beautifully described) setting. The plot is well thought out and full of surprises, especially the explosive (literally and figuratively) climax. However, Joe Leaphorn is a little too Man of Steel for me near the end: he hikes a dozen miles across the desert, gets bitten by a dog, falls down a cliff, etc., etc., and still has the energy left to perform a heroic rescue ... GIVE me a break!! In general, though, this is a great story, and I'd put it among the top four or five of Hillerman's mysteries.

"Listening Woman" is typical Tony Hillerman: a thrilling adventure in Navajo country, told from a Navajo's point of view and written by one who knows the lingo. The book begins with the totally impossible and progresses to a satisfying grand finale that couldn't be topped by a hot celebration on the 4th of July!

The characters are so true to life, one is certain that some of them must surely be neighbors or their neighbors' children. The action never ceases, and the reader never stops loving Joe Leaphorn.

Navajo Detective Joe Leaphorn works on several cases: the murder of an old Navajo man and a young girl, a missing helicopter, and a man wearing gold-rimmed glasses who tried to run over him. The search for answers takes him to the remote canyon country along the Arizona-Utah border.

This is the third novel in Hillerman's masterpiece series. The star of the show, Joe Leaphorn, is a likeable, honest, methodical man with a compulsion to find out the truth. Hillerman's strengths are authenticity and atmosphere. Navajo culture, religion, and folkways are woven into the fabric of his novels. His landscapes are harsh and spectacular. Nature is magnificent, but also menacing. In this exotic setting, the supernatural seems almost possible and little chilly fingers tickle your spine.

Leaphorn, something of a passive investigator in the first two novels of the series, is an action figure in "Listening Woman," confronting several ultra-violent killers. Hillerman allows his characters to grow and adds and subtracts characters as he goes along in the series. Captain Largo, Leaphorn's sardonic boss, makes his first appearance in this book.

"Listening Woman" suffers slightly from an ending drawn from action movies rather than real life, but it's a top quality mystery/western nevertheless. Anybody who is drawn to wide-open country and American Indian culture will love Tony Hillerman's books.

Like most fans of Hillerman, I've read them all. I'm sporadically going back through them and re-reading ones that I read more than a decade ago.

I've grown used to the older Leaphorn, the one that uses his head and thinks throuh problems and mostly avoids the physical stuff. This one is a younger Leaphorn that uses his head but gets involved in a lot of physical action. This one would make a great movie, but since I've not been happy with the few adaptations that I've seen I guess I'd prefer that no one make the attempt.

Lots of Navajo culture is introduced in this one. This one lays the groundwork for a lot of the future books, including multiple characters and does a lot of exploration into Leaphorn's quirky sense of interested agnosticism in regards to Navajo religious belief.

This one would be a good one for a book discussion group.

"Listening Woman" is the third book in Tony Hillerman's Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee mystery series. Out of the eighteen novels which make up the series, this novel, and book two, "Dance Hall of the Dead," are amongst my favorites. Although these are early works, the main characters are introduced here and are very well developed, more so than in later books where the public is more familiar with the protagonists. Also, in the early books, ("Listening Woman" was published in 1978), the author really gives a fresh feel for the Navajo and other Native American cultures of the Southwest. His descriptions seem to be more intense in "Listening Woman" than in his later novels. Throughout the entire series, Hillerman's love for the region and its peoples shines through.

Hosteen Tso is sick.and calls upon Mrs. Margaret Cigaret, known as Listening Woman, a blind Navajo healer, to diagnose and cure him. As she blesses the old man with corn pollen, she tells him, "You got trouble in your body." She directs her young niece, Anna Atcitty, to sing the song of "The Talking God," the one about "Born of Water and Monster Slayer." Anna is a pretty teenager, who proudly wears a T-shirt bearing the legends Ganado High School and Tiger Pep. Listening Woman chants, "In beauty it is finished. In beauty it is finished." The juxtaposition of the modern ways of Anna's more Anglo culture with that of her aunt's ancient customs is striking. Listening Woman asks Tso about his dreams, and about possible witches, dogs and wolves as characters who might people these dreams. He has not experienced visits from the supernatural while asleep, but informs the healer that there are some things he cannot talk about....things he promised, long ago, not to discuss. She leaves his hogan and goes to listen to the earth, which will hopefully tell her what makes the man sick.

Hosteen Tso and young Anna Atcitty are brutally murdered while Listening woman is out seeking her vision. The FBI are called in to investigate, but know little of the Navajo culture, nor are they familiar with the Four Corners region reservation, located where the states of Arizona, New Mexico, Utah and Colorado abut one another. Lieutenant Joe Leaphorn, the "Legendary Lieutenant," from the Navajo Tribal Police takes up the case after several months have passed. Listening Woman speaks, once again, of ghosts and of witches. Leaphorn is skeptical of traditional values and the supernatural, although he takes reports of witchcraft, and other related phenomena, seriously. He may not be a believer, but "he still treasures the old ways of his people," and realizes that the murder can be solved only with some inside knowledge of Navajo customs and traditions. He recruits Listening Woman and John McGinnis, the old trader on Short Mountain Trading Post, to assist him in acquiring more insight into local lore.

As with most of the author's novels, this mystery is complex and compelling. Lieutenant Leaphorn barely escapes with his life when a man wearing gold-rimmed glasses attempts to run him down with a car. Added to the mix are the theft of a helicopter, a radical Indian group that advocates violence, a seemingly wayward catholic priest, a large vicious dog, and a dead man's secret which stretches back more than one hundred years. All clues bring Leaphorn back to Hosteen Tso's hogan.

There is lots of action in this fast-paced thriller. Once more, what I love about Tony Hillerman's novels are the underlying themes which contrast Navajo ways with those of the "white" culture. He describes in glorious detail and awe the beauty of the Southwest. A must read!!
Jana Perskie

The Shape Shifter
Tony Hillerman's Navajoland: Hideouts, Haunts, and Havens in the Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee Mysteries
Blessing Way, The