Reviews with content warning for Cursing - The Round House

The non-five-star rating is completely down to my personal taste, because this is very clearly a masterpiece of a novel.

I am definitely a plot-driven person, but I enjoy picking up the occasional character-focused story. Joe and his community are absolutely fascinating, and though at times I wished we could move outside of his limited first-person perspective, it was both haunting and magical to see the events of the novel through his eyes.

What stood out to me the most was the emotional rawness—Erdrich takes readers into the kinds of emotional landscapes that are suffocating and overwhelming, but leads them through in the myriad ways all humans turn to: avoidance, escape, drunkenness, attempts to maintain some sort of control.

I loved Erdrich's style enough that I'm eager to pick up some of her other novels, and I highly recommend The Round House to anyone looking for a deeply-felt story of family, injustice, courage, and friendship.

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bangishimokwe's review

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dark emotional mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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sam_fielder_137's review

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adventurous challenging dark emotional reflective tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

I was mostly just bored. Since the main character is telling the story as an adult lawyer who's married, when we got to the climax, I knew everything would be okay. The stakes were low. The crime happened, they knew who did it. It was about justice, but didn't dive a lot into that aspect. I think the word "breast" was in the book more times than "justice" which is saying something. It was disturbing to read about a 13 year old boy's infatuation for his aunt, and the payoff for that was much too low.

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katsbooks's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

“Now that I knew fear, I also knew it was not permanent. As powerful as it was, its grip on me would loosen. It would pass.”

“We are never so poor that we cannot bless another human being, are we? So it is that every evil, whether moral or material, results in good. You'll see.”

This was a very intense read. Definitely check trigger warnings for this book. It started a little slow for me but really picked up as it went. Generally, I like to listen to general fiction because I find it doesn't hold my attention the way romance, fantasy or thrillers. That's how I started this novel but found it fairly easy to finish it physically. My main complaint is that I didn't like that there weren't any quotation marks. I get that it's a literature choice but I don't really get it. Other than that, there wasn't a whole lot that I didn't like about this book. My favorite aspect was probably the perspective. It was so effective to make the main character's perspective that of a 13-year-old boy. It took all of the serious, intense themes and filtered them through the semi-innocent eyes of a pubescent boy. It genuinely made so much of the story more impactful. I also really appreciated the commentary on how Native Americans straddle the line between tribal soveriegnty and American jurisdiction, especially when it comes to things like rape cases or crime perpretrated by white people on reservations. It was also really interesting to read a depiction of reservation life.

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internationalreads's review

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challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad fast-paced

4.5

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suzanlemont's review

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dark emotional informative sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

This was an incredibly well-written book with so many well-structured elements: suspense/mystery, family relationships, adolescence/coming of age, Native American culture. The ending would normally leave me upset but the author has the wise foresight to weave in some threads earlier on that let you know that the end of the book is not all there is, and this saved it from becoming one of those stories I hate that leave you dangling and dissatisfied. The casually descriptive language adds texture and wit to an-already compelling story and an air of authenticity that I could feel in my bones. This is neither a romanticized nor grungy/bigoted view of life on a Native American reservation - the characters are fresh and honest, the emotions are real without being overwhelming or just for shock effect. Very well done; i was riveted. There are even a few chuckles. Now I wan to go back and read Erdrich's Love Medicine which I read a very long time ago because I think she's brilliant.

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brennach's review against another edition

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emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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battybookworm's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional funny reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This was a book assigned for my American Lit class. It is probably my second favorite that we read this term. The first half is hard to read, it opens with an assault, so if that's triggering for you this is probably not a great book to read. Following Joe, the son of the woman assaulted, through these life events is something really powerful and there's so much to this book that I could never properly summarize. It has reinvigorated my wish to read everything of Erdrich's cause I get to the end of her novels and am instantly wondering why there aren't a hundred more pages to get through: I just can't get enough of her words and her characters! There's so much to feel and so many people to love in this novel!

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