Book review of "The Insufficiency of Maps"

[Thunderwolf, MSN, RN]

'The Insufficiency of Maps'

By Nora Pierce

Atria Books, $20

Nora Pierce's new novel tells of a life lived on the fringes. The world is seen through the eyes of Alice, an American Indian child, whose mother is an alcoholic schizophrenic.

The reader is terrified on behalf of this girl, but Alice walks forth in innocence, trusting the grown-ups around her.

When she and her mother are hitchhiking, well, her mother is just as apt to be naked as not. And when it comes to Alice's education, well, her mother never would have sent her to school if an aunt hadn't stopped by and insisted. Unprepared, Alice bumbles a bit during her first days in class, but she catches on.

At one point, her mother explains what it is like to be an alcoholic-schizophrenic-Native American, "Even on the reservation, next to all my old uncles and aunts, on the same land where the Shinnecock were born, I just felt like a leftover, like a ghost."

The title implies that whatever map Alice and her mother had for life seems to have been misplaced. Still, everywhere she goes, Alice is surrounded by people who love her-not well enough, and not always in a sane way, but they do love her. --Susan Whitney

Review taken from the site:

http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,680196130,00.html

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