The Women's Warrior Society (Sun Tracks) [Paperback]

Lois Beardslee (Author)

Book Description

Series: Sun Tracks | Publication Date: March 1, 2008

The Women’s Warrior Society is a remarkable gathering of characters and voices used to expose truths about Native American life. In tightly woven prose, Lois Beardslee tells stories about people from all over North America and from either side of the line between abused and abuser. Both individual and archetypal, Native and non-Native, male and female, her characters take up arms against widely accepted stereotypes about Native people. The women warriors in these tales have lived through a variety of mishaps, experiencing the consequences brought on by misinformation and the misguided efforts of institutions and individuals. Armed with this experience, they gather in unlikely “sweatlodges”—from kitchen tables to public libraries—transforming into she-wolves who, lips curled, snarl at their own victimization and assert that hope for future generations is maintained through creativity, determination, and the preservation of traditional values. This is political writing at its most honest and creative. Beardslee’s style is poetic and lyrical, and her voice, shifting as it does, both grips us with terrible tone and comforts us with familiar assurance. A fierce call to action, this book reads like a song cycle—both singing to us and demanding that we sing in response. Beardslee creates new strategies and measures of success. Her warriors dance, bark, howl, and transform themselves in unexpected ways that invoke tears, laughter, even awe. They are, above all, driven, successful, and eternally hopeful.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Hard to describe in a few words is this thought-provoking, moving, and confrontational collection of stories by Beardslee, an Ojibwa-Lacandon artist, author, and teacher. In a simultaneously lyrical and brutally honest style, she elucidates the Native truths kept alive by the Women’s Warrior Society—truths “you didn’t read about in Anthropology 101”—which seeks to relegate Indian stereotypes to the trash bin. Making use of resonant metaphors—Native women as she-wolves, tribal libraries as sweat lodges—Beardslee dramatizes the lives of seasonal workers making $7.05 per hour packing cherries in Michigan, the struggles of mothers to instill Native culture in their children to replace the self-loathing resulting from racism they experience in an all-white educational system, and the ingenious way in which a savvy mother teaches her child the intricacies of grammar while at the same time passing along a traditional Native fable. These powerfully imagined “women with attitude and women with histories of malcontent . . . who sing like wolves” prod us to amend our own actions; their ringing words are meant to be savored, then shared. --Deborah Donovan --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Review

“Hard to describe in a few words is this thought-provoking, moving, and confrontational collection of stories by Beardslee, an Ojibwa-Lacandon artist, author, and teacher. In a simultaneously lyrical and brutally honest style, she elucidates the Native truths kept alive by the Women’s Warrior Society. These powerfully imagined 'women with attitude [and] women with histories of malcontent . . . who sing like wolves' prod us to amend our own actions; their ringing words are meant to be savored, then shared.” —Booklist "These [women warriors]—despite the best intentions of the dominant society—are not going away. And someone really ought to give Lois Beardslee that Pulitzer." —Multicultural Review

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 160 pages
• Publisher: University of Arizona Press (March 1, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0816526729
• ISBN-13: 978-0816526727
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 6 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,222,481 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

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