Medicine River [Hardcover]

Thomas King (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

First novelist King, a professor of American and Native American studies and himself of Cherokee, Greek and German descent, sets his gentle, deliberate and ultimately engaging comedy about a group of contemporary Native Americans in a small Canadian community. Will returns to Medicine River, a town just outside a Blackfoot reserve, to bury his mother and reconsider his past. In short order he finds himself very much caught up in the present, opening a photography studio and playing on the local basketball team. His best friend and sometime coach, Harlan Bigbear, quickly convinces him to get involved with pregnant, unwed (and rich) Louise Heavyman. Will visits with Martha Oldcrow, the marriage doctor, and grapples with David Plume, just back from the protest at Wounded Knee. He meets other wanderers, from Joe Bigbear, Harlan's brother, a world traveler and storyteller par excellence, to Bertha Morley, who leaves the reservation to try her luck with a Calgary dating service. King's deceptively simple comedy is an intriguing portrait of Native American life today.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From School Library Journal

YA-- Medicine River is a small town near an Indian reserve in Western Canada. Narrated by the town's only Native American photographer, the loosely woven episodes revolve around Harlen Bigbear, whose specialty is providing "general maintenance" to his friends and acquaintances. There is humor and warmth, whether Harlen is persuading Will--who is over 40--to play on the all-Native basketball team or to court Louise Heavyhands, or whether he is arranging the lives of his neighbors and friends. Interwoven into the story are the narrator's bittersweet experiences of growing up with his brother, James; enduring the eccentricities of his Native American mother; and wondering about the white father he doesn't remember. These characters all fall within the mainstream of American cultural experience, yet they should expand YAs' multicultural awareness.
- Ruth Melvin, R. E. Lee High School, Springfield, VA
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Viking Adult; First Edition edition (September 4, 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0670829625
• ISBN-13: 978-0670829620
• Product Dimensions: 8.6 x 5.6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (14 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,139,414 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A wonderful read..., December 14, 2000

By 

Caz - See all my reviews

This review is from: Medicine River (Paperback)

This title was my second foray into the realm of King's writing, and I found it to be as rewarding as the first (his latest novel, Truth and Bright Water - another superb read).

Medicine River is the story of Will and his best friend Harlen, and a cast of other lovable, hilarious characters as they go about their day-to-day life. There is intrigue and gossip, speculation and antics, all true to form for any typical nuclear community. The book's dialogue is superb - and laugh-out-loud funny. The reader will embrace Harlen's quirky views with glee and will sigh right along with Will, as he diligently works to get Harlen around to the punchline. Wonderful exchanges.

King has an incredible gift - it's that of showcasing the heartbreak of life against the backdrop of humour, and he does it with style, class, and ingenuity. He continues this fine tradition in Medicine River. The plight and struggle of the Native community is seen through Will's recollections of growing up fatherless. He spells out the hardships his mother endured while trying to raise him and his younger brother on her own. The story of many souls across the land, and King - through Will - has done a class act job portraying the depths of experience. The healing balm in Thomas's writings is, of course, laughter and humour, and you'll get lots of that in this novel.

The New York Times said of this book, "Precise and elegant... a most satisfying read." I'm in full agreement. An excellent book and worthy of a spot of your bookshelf. I highly recommend it.

19 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Insightful Look into the Complexities of Human Beings, November 18, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Medicine River (Paperback)

This intricately woven novel is a modern masterpiece. Although I showed the movie (starring Graham Greene as Will) in my class this semester, most of my students clamored to read the book as well, and as a result got a fuller experience for having done so. King is able to say so very much about the nature of human beings while at the same time adds the touch of humor that seems to be so lacking in most modern novels with something to say. I have read this book at least five times, and have purchased more than six copies--I keep lending them to friends or giving them as gifts. Read Thomas King--a clear, welcome voice for the new millenium.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gentle, sad, and very funny . . ., November 19, 2004

By 

Ronald Scheer "rockysquirrel" (Los Angeles) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Medicine River (Paperback)

I really enjoyed this novel. Like a number of modern Native American authors, Thomas King tells of life among reservation Indians that's free of stereotypes and sentimentality. His central character, Will, a half-breed, lives and works as a photographer in a town called Medicine River, not far from Alberta's Blackfeet reservation. Somewhat passive and resigned to the lot he has chosen in life, his solitude is disrupted almost daily by Harlen Bigbear, a gregarious friend who knows the business of everyone in the Indian community and actively tries to act in everyone's best interest. In other words, he's a meddler.

The novel is a series of loosely strung together incidents, involving Harlen's attempts to make things happen, not the least of which are his efforts to get Will to marry the unmarried mother of a little girl with the unlikely name of South Wing. The present day stories are intercut with flashbacks to Will's past, growing up with a younger brother, their father a white cowboy having long deserted the family. And there are flashbacks to a time in his adult life in Toronto, where he became involved unknowingly with a married woman.

I loved the gentle and ironic humor of this novel, the many characters who spring to life from the pages, and the roundabout indirection of Indian dialogue, including the persistent way in which people seem not to listen to each other. I recommend this book to anyone interested in the North American West, modern day Indians, and a style of storytelling that speaks from heart.