The Master Butchers Singing Club (eBook)

Description

Having survived World War I, Fidelis Waldvogel returns to his quiet German village and marries the pregnant widow of his best friend, killed in action. With a suitcase full of sausages and a master butcher's precious knife set, Fidelis sets out for America. In Argus, North Dakota, he builds a business, a home for his family—which includes Eva and four sons—and a singing club consisting of the best voices in town. When the Old World meets the New—in the person of Delphine Watzka—the great adventure of Fidelis's life begins. Delphine meets Eva and is enchanted. She meets Fidelis, and the ground trembles. These momentous encounters will determine the course of Delphine's life, and the trajectory of this brilliant novel.

About the Author

Louise Erdrich lives with her family in Minnesota and is the owner of Birchbark Books, an independent bookstore. Ms. Erdrich is a member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa, and this story—which will, in the end, span one hundred years in the life of an Ojibwe woman—was inspired when Ms. Erdrich and her mother, Rita Gourneau Erdrich, were researching their own family history. Chickadee begins a new part of the story that started with The Birchbark House, a National Book Award finalist; The Game of Silence, winner of the Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction; and the acclaimed The Porcupine Year.

Ms. Erdrich is also the bestselling author of many critically acclaimed novels for adults, including the Pulitzer Prize finalist The Plague of Doves and National Book Award finalist The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse. She is also the author of the picture book Grandmother's Pigeon, illustrated by Jim LaMarche.

Praise for The Master Butchers Singing Club…

“Emotionally resonant.”
-Michiko Kakutani, New York Times

“Miraculous …[Erdrich is] at the peak of powers as a writer … Her work is as melodious as ever.”
-Boston Globe

“An enrapturing plunge into the depths of the human heart.”
-Washington Post Book World

“[A] masterpiece… Erdrich never hits a false note.”
-Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

“Louise Erdrich’s rousing and radiant new novel THE MASTER BUTCHERS SINGING CLUB is all kinds of lovely.”
-Newsweek

“Each moment and its particulars dazzles … Fidelis and firm-bellied Delphine and the rest [of the characters] are masterworks.”
-San Francisco Chronicle

“THE MASTER BUTCHERS SINGING CLUB can surely be cast as the most wrenching and wise of Erdrich’s nine novels.”
-Miami Herald

“A brilliantly layered look at war’s costs …Daring, graceful, comprehending and, rooted in the great plains, uniquely American.”
-Kansas City Star

“The Master Butchers Singing Club reveals on of our finest writers at the peak of her considerable powers.”
-Minneapolis Star Tribune

“Rich and vibrant …Magnificent.”
-Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

“Lush and stark … employing vivid imagery, deft description and dialogue that flows … Stunning language.”
-St. Louis Post-Dispatch

“[A] magnificent tale … poignant in the mysteries it evokes and patient with the questions is leaves unanswered.”
-Los Angeles Times Book Review

“A substantial, beautifully composed, confident work of art … both expansive in its reach and intimate in its intense focus.”
-O magazine

“Not since Ricard Russo’s 2001 novel EMPIRE FALLS ... have I enjoyed the company of such memorable characters.”
-Bob Minzesheimer, USA Today

“Louise Erdrich hits every note in THE MASTER BUTCHERS SINGING CLUB”
-Vanity Fair

“Satisfying and life-affirming.”
-Atlantic Monthly

“[THE MASTER BUTCHERS SINGING CLUB] is marked by moments of true creative genius, exquisitely imagined and masterfully drawn.”
-Richmond Times-Dispatch

“Erdrich is an abundantly gifted storyteller, with a penchant for meticulous detail and tremendous empathy for her characters.”
-Charlotte Observer

“Appropriately grim and thoughtful, THE MASTER BUTCHERS SINGING CLUB is also full of tenderness and life … Marvelous.”
-Entertainment Weekly

“A thoughtful, artful, painfully moving addition to an ongoing American saga .. unimaginably rich.”
-Kirkus Reviews

“Delphine, the book’s central figure, is Erdrich’s most finely wrought and compelling character.”
-Denver Rocky Mountain News

“Grand and generous fiction… Erdrich’s most sweeping and ambitious yet.”
-BookPage