The Only Good Indians

By Stephen Graham Jones

"Thrilling, literate, scary, immersive."
—Stephen King
The Stoker, Mark Twain American Voice in Literature, Bradbury, Locus and Alex Award-winning, NYT-bestselling gothic horror about cultural identity, the price of tradition and revenge for fans of Adam Nevill's The Ritual.
Ricky, Gabe, Lewis and Cassidy are men bound to their heritage, bound by society, and trapped in the endless expanses of the landscape. Now, ten years after a fateful elk hunt, which remains a closely guarded secret between them, these men – and their children – must face a ferocious spirit that is coming for them, one at a time. A spirit which wears the faces of the ones they love, tearing a path into their homes, their families and their most sacred moments of faith.
Ten years after that fateful hunt, these men are being stalked themselves. Soaked with a powerful gothic atmosphere, the endless expanses of the landscape press down on these men – and their children – as the ferocious spirit comes for them one at a time.
The Only Good Indians, charts Nature's revenge on a lost generation that maybe never had a chance. Cleaved to their heritage, these parents, husbands, sons and Indians, men live on the fringes of a society that has rejected them, refusing to challenge their exile to limbo.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Titan Books
• Release date: Jul 21, 2020
• ISBN: 9781789095302

Stephen Graham Jones

Stephen Graham Jones is the New York Times bestselling author of The Only Good Indians. He has been an NEA fellowship recipient and a recipient of several awards including the Ray Bradbury Award from the Los Angeles Times, the Bram Stoker Award, the Shirley Jackson Award, the Jesse Jones Award for Best Work of Fiction from the Texas Institute of Letters, the Independent Publishers Award for Multicultural Fiction, and the Alex Award from American Library Association. He is the Ivena Baldwin Professor of English at the University of Colorado Boulder.

Reviews for The Only Good Indians

[burritapal · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a horror story about Crow and Blackfeet. It's a story of revenge. A teenage mother pregnant elk is going to"get" the Indians that shot her, and buried her still-breathing calf. It is a very satisfying story, and really, one that I wish were real, and happened always, with every innocent animal murdered needlessly, by humans.

[ejlesny · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I wasn't able to finish this book. I had such a tough time grasping what the book was even discussing, let alone the metaphors of the deer. By the time I got to point where the young girl entered, I could no longer say I understood the book at all. I had to stop. I had similar trouble with Grahams, "Night of the Mannequins". It's as if there is prior knowledge for each book. Maybe I just didn't have my thinking cap on that day, but I had to put it down unfortunately.

[vnfc-501969 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Such a fun read. I'd highly recommend it. It's dark at times but in a twists and turns way.

[technodiabla · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I picked this book up at a used bookstore on a whim. It's not a genre I read much of but something about it intrigued me. This novel tell the story of 4 American Indians who cross the line and hunt on sacred grounds. Years later, the past starts to haunt them as the plot turns supernatural-horror. It turned out to be a very good read. The writing was very good and there's a lot going on besides the primary plot line. There' much social commentary about identity, revenge, and tradition. I would recommend this book with a caveat that there's quite a lot of gory scenes and horrific things happen to both people and animals. So it isn't for everyone.

[eas7788 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Spoilers. I so rarely read horror because I don't like to read scenes of grisly death/killing and I don't like the sense of inevitable, impending doom that feels in service of a genre rather than intrinsic to a story. I loved this book because despite having the first item, it didn't have the second. There was a point to the gore, to the dread and horror. I appreciated that the horror was all from within the native community--this is an Indian story, not an Indian and whites story. I hated the deaths of women and dogs and decent men, but when I reached the final sections, I understood. Denorah's victory means so much because of what comes before. The stakes are as high as they can be. And the ending becomes so much bigger than just Denorah's struggle. It's the particular becoming the universal. It's the unfamiliar and the familiar intertwined. All that big stuff I like. And meanwhile, the writing is SO GOOD. Characters vivid, scenes shaped beautifully, action sharp. I want more of his work ....

[norabelle414 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Audiobook narrated by Shaun Taylor-Corbett - Four teenage boys carelessly kill the wrong elk during hunting season on their Blackfeet reservation. They made a stupid mistake, but no one saw them, so they hid it. Ten years later they have scattered to the wind and started their own lives and their own families, but the elk remembers and picks them off, one by one.Absolutely unique and so imaginative! Really spooky horror. The author does very cool things with perspective, switching between the elk spirit and the individual victims up until their deaths. There doesn’t feel like any good guys or bad guys here. The boys knew they shouldn’t be hunting in that area, but their deaths are gruesome and torturous and affect so many other people. The spirit’s revenge feels both awful and inevitable. Highly recommend this as an audiobook, for the vibes.

[sharonmariabidwell · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

I want to like this book. It’s got a plot with potential; a blend of an ill-conceived elk hunt, a vengeful spirit, and generations of faith and heritage, though I’m not sure I’d classify this as horror. Sadly, I feel I had to drag myself through its pages, so I took weeks to read this in small snippets, and skimmed most of the basketball sections, which is one of the many passages that go on too long. Many of the sentences are ropey, and at first read aren’t clear, requiring they be read as a whole to guess or piece together what’s happening. Many scenes are simply muddy owing to the convoluted style, which made the book rather boring. I’m sorry to say this writer’s style simply isn’t for me, but it seems to garner polarising reviews, so I’d suggest trying a sample and making up your own mind.

[weird_o · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

When he stood, there was a sea of green eyes staring back at him from right there, where there was just supposed to be frozen grass and distance.It was a great herd of elk, waiting, blocking him in, and there was a great herd pressing in behind him, too, a herd of men already on the blacktop themselves, their voices rising, hands balled into fists, eyes flashing white.INDIAN MAN KILLED IN DISPUTE OUTSIDE BAR.That's one way to say it.The Indian man was Ricky Boss Ribs, who had left the Blackfeet reservation for work in North Dakota with an oil drilling crew. Ten years before, Ricky and three friends from the rez—Lewis, Cass, and Gabe—made a lot of trouble for themselves hunting in a restricted area. Only teens at the time, they were denied hunting rights thereafter. That in itself eroded their friendship. But the need to find employment, the desire to find girlfriends, to start families, also weakened the bond among them. Some time after Ricky's death, another of the four, Lewis, stumbled into trouble and made the headlines:THREE DEAD, ONE INJURED IN MANHUNTFour Shelby men were attacked last night, following the apprehension of the fugitive Lewis A. Clarke…who had apparently been fleeing back to his tribe's ancestral reservation. Clarke was the main suspect in the brutal murders of both his wife and a federal coworker.…According to sources at the hospital…the four Shelby men had in the back of their truck both Clarke and the deer or elk calf he had apparently been carrying for reasons unknown.…[S]omeone stood from the bed of the truck while it was moving. It was a girl of twelve or fourteen. Indian. Presumably she had climbed into the truck earlier, when it was headed west.When the driver of the vehicle slowed to keep her from falling or blowing out, and alerted his three cab mates to her, the survivor says the girl "rushed forward over the toolbox" and "through the rear window" into the cab, which is where the eyewitness testimony ends.Lewis, of course, was not a survivor. The young girl…disappeared. Who was she? And why was Lewis carrying a deer or elk calf? While trying to outrun the authorities, don't you know. This doesn't have anything to do with that murky hunting incident of a decade ago, right? With Ricky being killed? (If you were reading the book instead of this pitiful report, you'd know the answers. But you'd still be mystified. Questions remain unasked. So far. It's creepy, yeah?)Just read it.

[jorgeousjotts · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This felt quite strange, but I don't read a lot of horror stories, so it might not be that much further out there than usual. For maybe the first half of the book even, I felt a little like I might have been missing something, but I don't believe I actually had. By the second half, I was still knocked off kilter sometimes, but I felt more confident that I was following along as well as anyone might. It's a little bit grizzly, but also interesting and sort of darkly poetic. I'm glad I read it.

[caseyadamsstark · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

More than a horror novel Make no mistake, this is more than a horror novel with a Native American inspired monster. There is an underlying theme in The Only Good Indians, one that shines a light on what it means to be a Native American trapped in modern America. Trapped by what the white man expects you to be and finding no way out of it, no way off the reservation except to die. Or maybe there is hope. I guess you'll have to read the book to see.There is plenty of gut wrenching horror here, and the characters are not always likable, except they're trying. They’re trying to be better than what they were born to be in the eyes of the rest of America. And the diehard horror fans will probably catch a too obvious hint near the end concerning which final characters live or die.But the deeper meaning that I got from the story is what pushed me to rate it from a four to a five. Well worth the read.

[thebookqueensx · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

a solid 4.5 for me, but I will round down to a 4TW: blood, death, violence against animals, death of animals, graphic descriptions, alcoholism, violence, etc.* I am not a #ownvoices reviewer*I originally heard about this book from @booksandlala in her "Reading the Goodreads Horror Winners" video and I was intrigued. the story takes you along with a group of four Native friends who are being haunted (and hunted) by an entity from something they did 10 years ago.when I read the beginning of the book, I was a little skeptical. I wasn't really vibing with the opening scene, but it does a good job of introducing the 'thing' that is hunting them and is the start of the book bringing in Native struggles. once I got past this scene, I was hooked. the way that this story weaves together and keeps you wondering had me on edge the entire time. not to mention the ending where the POV switches into 2nd and you, the reader, become the hunter.pros:~amazing and interesting use of 2nd person POV~good characterization~interesting plotline and story~excelent representation of Native struggles against media, police, people outside thecommunity, etc.~good discussion around things like alcoholism, trauma, interracial relationships~great narrator (i listened to some of the book on Libby)cons:~sometimes confusing when it switches POVs~too many dead dogs (this is just a personal thing. I hate hearing about peoples pets dying inawful ways, fictional or not)~pacing can be a little weird and all over the place at times

[jen_bartels-1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Audio: Honestly, after finishing this I really only wanted to give it 2 stars, but I went with 3 because I think the Audio was a mistake for me and didn't want to punish the story for my error. I feel like at some point I missed something and that caused me to not be "in" the story. Based on what I listened to, I think it has potential and because of this I will one day actually read the book and give it the fair shake it deserves. What I can tell you about the story is that it is full of Native American lore which I did find interesting. It is also pretty gruesome, not just involving people, but animals, which I know is harder to stomach for a lot of readers so figured a warning was in order. Also, by the end I was getting more into the story and I was all in on the action, concerned for the last victim because their fight and determination were fierce. So yes, three stars because I believe the fault of me not loving it is mine, not the book's. Also, I think this author has an interesting voice so I will check out their other works.

[gothamajp · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Based on reviews and critical acclaim a lot of people really like this book - unfortunately I’m not one of them. It has an interesting premise and provides some eye-opening insights into the Native American perspective. But I found the rambling narrative style and strange grammar choices and sentence structure off putting to the extent that I had to work hard at times to figure out what was going on. When I read I generally forget I’m actually going through the process and mechanics of reading I just exist within the story and get drawn along with the narrative. With this book I was way too aware that I was “reading” and felt like an outsider looking in, and as a result I just didn’t care about any of the characters or what happened to them.

[sturlington_1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I thought this was SGJ's most mature novel to date, and really good horror, to boot. Real horror, as well--in that there are scenes that will horrify you. This is a tale of revenge sparked by the unjust killing of an elk by four young Indian men. The monster that arises out of that act is unique and terrifying, yet feels grounded in Blackfeet lore. The Indian characters seem real and whole, yet SGJ manages to weave in important commentary on reservation life and the historical treatment of Native Americans without coming across as preachy. The climax is never-wracking suspense, but the ending is not what you might expect and poses a potential solution to never-ending conflict.

[librolindsay · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

100% would watch a movie adaptation of this novel.

[kristelh_15 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I liked this story because it really brought out the life and culture of the Native American. I liked that it was circular and really enjoyed the use of the elk in the story. It really is "horror"; there was times I was cringing.

[deltaqueen50 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I found The Only Good Indians by Steven Graham Jones a strange story of supernatural revenge as four American Indian men find themselves fighting for their lives against an entity that wants to exact revenge upon them as payback for how they exterminated an elk herd 10 years ago. Lines were crossed that day when they opened fire upon the elk, killing more than they should have, including one young female who was pregnant. Tribal and cultural rules were also broken as the young men should not have been hunting at that location as this was land designated for use by the tribal elders.The book opens with the death of one of these young men, Ricky. The official cause of death was that he was beaten to death outside a bar, but from Ricky’s perspective, there were elk there that night. We next read of Lewis who is still haunted by the memory of that day. When he starts to see visions of the female elk, his suspicions and guilt overtakes him. As the entity gains in strength it finally goes after the last two men, Gabe and Cass, who still live on the reservation. They experience the anger of the elk as well.I never was fully absorbed by this story, and the changing perspectives, including that of the elk, was confusing. Although I felt a certain amount of empathy for the all the characters at one time or another, the sheer weirdness of the story and the level of violence made The Only Good Indians a rather disturbing horror novel.

[shrike58 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This novel has so much going for it, particularly a great climax and ending, that I have to feel like I'm being a bit churlish splitting hairs, as I oscillated between 3.5 and 4 stars. What it boils down to is that none of the four men who set in motion the horrors really have a part to play in the endgame of the story, and that feels like a structural problem to me. Your mileage may differ, and I'd probably let you convince me that the real story in the book is that of the character who does rise to the occasion in the end.

[narshkite · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a 3.4 for me, but I think the issues are all mine, not SGRs. First things first, the writing here is great, clear, evocative, liberally dotted with smart and subtle humor. I am not a horror reader, and generally do not gravitate to fantasy and folklore. I think I have a faulty imagination. There are exceptions, fantasy and horror I have liked a great deal, but this didn't get there for me. That is all to say that the Blackfeet legend was appreciated, but this lousy reader did not connect with it at a heart level. The first half of the book (not counting the first chapter, which was dynamite) was more in 2-3 star territory, but the last third was riveting, so it balanced out for me. What an ode to indigenous women! I did fall in love with Denora.I also loved the way the climax was structured around a no holds barred basketball matchup. I could absolutely see everything happening in my minds eye like I had a front row seat.

[booksandliquids · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Stephen Graham Jones touches a lot of serious topics Indigenous people face, all while crafting a truly suspenseful horror story that felt classic and fresh in all the good ways. I was entertained by this book, and I also feel I have learned so much from it, and for me, these are the best kinds of books.

Altough I love the folk horror elements, I think the true heart of this story are the characters. They are layered and conflicted and we get to see them through their own eyes as well as through the eyes of others, we get to see their expectations of themselves, the expectations that are placed on them and how that effects every single life - theirs and the ones they touch. We see different faces of intergenerational trauma, what it does to people and how it might be overcome.

It took me a minute to get used to the writing style, but it does fit the brutality and honesty of the book perfectly. And yes, this book is brutal in many ways. And honest. And I loved the ending

I wholeheartedly recommend it.

[rivkat_2 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

After a group of young male friends slaughters elk where they shouldn’t have, the spirit of Elk Head Woman comes after them. While racism and poverty structure their lives and explain something about why they did it, Elk Head Woman doesn’t care. Warning for gore.

[jphamilton-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Only Good Indians is just fabulous, such a grand and horrific way to enter a new year of reading. It’s a fascinating twist of Native writing and beliefs, mixed with some intense basketball, thrown together with some grizzly violence, and horror is always lurking. It is folklore come to life when a vile act from ten years before not only haunts the characters, but kills the responsible ones. There’s a weirdness to the story that solidly hooked me early, and then pulled me through some wild, bloody, and surreal scenes. The central act of the story was the disrespectful slaughter of too many elk on sacred land, and an elk calf that passes through time and rationality. Lewis was one of those four Blackfeet hunters, and he had to take extra measures to kill one doe, who had been carrying a calf that survived. That calf will haunt him in many ways throughout the book, ways that the reader will have to decide which are real, delusional, or mystical. Lewis has hallucinations about the calf, and later the shape-shifting Elk Head Woman. The hunt happened just before Thanksgiving, but as they were caught by the game warden, the irony is that they came away from it with no meat, a ten-year hunting ban, and that calf. The writing has an intricate sensitivity to it, and shows how guilt can warp and crush what some call reality. A brutality lurks. A line from the author Terese Marie Mailhot is quoted on the back cover and it fits perfectly here, “I like stories where nobody escapes their pasts because it’s what I fear most.” Stephen Graham Jones is writing from deep within the Blackfeet people, focusing on these four hunters who are all very unique and flawed in their own ways. The four friends (Lewis, Gabe, Cass, and Ricky) are pure blooded Native Americans, but they prefer the term Indians, as ‘One little, two little, three little natives’ simply doesn’t sound right to them. The book is a captivating collection of culture, reality, paranoia, violence, belief, and guilt, and it’s all from such a unique viewpoint. The book made me jump, cringe, laugh, and love the characters and the writing. This would be the perfect book for some bookstore to start their Native Horror section with.

[ebt1002 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Being classified as a horror novel by the author himself as well as critics and readers, this is not my usual fare. And it was excellent. Four young Blackfeet men were involved in a pretty ugly hunting incident ten years ago. Over the decade, they have moved on their lives, grown up and largely grown apart. This novel is the story of how that long-ago incident finds them, haunts them, and affects them. It is a tale of revenge, of the settling of scores. It is also a tale of family, of hope and heart. Suspend your disbelief and dive in, but perhaps not late at night when your alarm will go off early. It is definitely not a cure for insomnia.

[sprainedbrain · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This is only my second book by Stephen Graham Jones, but I’m fairly confident that it has solidified him as one of my favorite contemporary horror authors.

I read this book in one day, and supplemented with audio when I absolutely had to get up and do responsible adult things. As much as I read, the one-day book is still sort of a rarity for me. Read: this is a great book.
First and foremost, this is a horror novel. Reading it was a bit like watching a slasher movie. It’s gory, there’s lots of death, a bonafide monster, and I was genuinely frightened more than once. That the ‘monster’ has a legitimate case for revenge adds another interesting layer to the story.

The Only Good Indians is more than a scary horror novel, though. Stephen Graham Jones gives us a look into the lives and minds of his Native characters. Lewis and his friends aren’t bad people, and the glimpses I got of their individual stories made me invested in them. This makes it all the more distressing to have their stories descend into madness and pain. It’s absolutely devastating.

Jones’ writing is fantastic. Descriptive and deceptive, with frequent switches in POV that add so much to the experience. Such a gritty, heartbreakingly sad, fear-inducing read that I could not stop reading. And then that ending. Such a surprisingly hopeful, kick-ass ending.

If you like horror with well-crafted characters, read this freaking book. And if you like audiobooks, consider the brilliantly narrated audio read by Shaun Taylor-Corbett. The acknowledgements read by the author at the end are worth a listen as well.

[richardderus · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I RECEIVED A DRC OF THIS NOVEL FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.Y'ALL. AIN'T. FOUND. HIM. YET. I mean, in your millions who buy Clive Barker and Stephen King. That's the audience that Stephen Graham Jones merits. Major film franchises. TV development deals. The whole shootin' match.Because this is top-quality writing, using the bones of the genre fleshed out in new and interesting ways. Psychological splatterpunk. Rez Noir. Gore with more.And now the literary crowd is making "get-up-and-leave" noises. No, no! Sit down. This book isn't another exploitation of "Noble Savages Get Revenge Via Folklore" (seriously, go to Goodreads and search "the wendigo" to see what I mean about exploitation...monsterporn galore and white people writing from their deep personal knowledge of Native American life as far back as 1910). It is #OwnVoices do horror. The point of #OwnVoices is moot if it is construed by the very white people who celebrate it so vocally if it can't be applied to *sniff* mere genre fiction. (And for the record I'm all down with white people reading more Otherwork. I just find the labeling a bit depressing and not a little bit condescending. Do y'all really need roadmaps to find an interest in people who are-but-aren't like you?)You are defined by the worst thing you've ever done. We all are. But what if the worst thing you've ever done offended not only the social norms and personal dignity of the community you live in, but the very powers of the Universe your community resides among? (There are different powers in every community...?) What the hell is wrong with you, first...you can't not know what you're doing is offensive when you are sneaking around...and second, when you're going against the Universal powers that little sick feeling in your gut should tell you to break the hell off, abort, and go back to where you were before. I speak from experience. As does our point-of-view character, Lewis. One of four buddies who need to get their freezers full before winter hunger attackes their families, these goofuses trespass on the Elders's land to bag an elk. They do that, alright, so strike one. It's a female, strike two. She's pregnant, strike three. The game police, the tribal councils, AND the Universal powers are all lined up to take turns beating up these criminals.The rest of the review is on my blog.

[mhartford_3 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Bleak and beautiful, heartbreaking and hopeful, with a really intense ending - definitely one of the best books I've read this year. It had some surprising twists - I thought it was one thing when I started, then it very abruptly became something else entirely - and great characters.

[dedduckie · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

The Only Good Indians, authored by Stephen Graham Jones, was a birthday buy for myself. It was released on my actual birthday, along with Wonderland by Zoje Stage, so I was feeling pretty chuffed with myself; both hardcover editions had hauntingly lovely covers. I rated this 5 stars.By the end of the opening chapter I felt as if a great clock had begun ticking down, to what I did not know; but it didn’t look good for those involved. There were many points while reading, I’ll admit I was doing some sniffling, had to widen my eyes a bit to stop the waterworks from getting started, or as a last line of defense, looking up from the page to stare at the wall or Biscuit (my cat). I had to give up the ghost by the end, give in to a little emotional break, fully; akin to lancing a deep hurt, I was left feeling lighter but weary. Mapping the Interior was my introduction to SGJ, a novella that wasted no words in wringing out everything, leaving me gutted and a fan for life. This novel is a heavy hitter in the same way, showcasing the human bonds that we forge that can last us a lifetime, shining a light on the indigenous people that are always further and further swept into tighter corners of a land that used to be open, beautifully wild, and theirs; but now often burning or drowning. I have watched or read horror from single digits; Hitchcock, Poe, then Lovecraft and some King were my introductions via my dad’s library and blessing. I adopted a quirk for keeping myself from getting too scared while diving into my horrors, it couldn’t happen to me because I’m not breaking whatever rule the poor characters in question were breaking. Example, I did not allow myself to enter the house of redneck cannibals of my own volition, ending in my murder. That doesn’t really hold up with SGJ. Innocents are just as liable to be struck down, if not more so, before the guilty. And then this even harder one, what if there are no seriously guilty ones being punished, no tremendous enemies to hate on? Four friends make a memory. There are parts that all of them share equally, they could agree easily “That’s the way it happened.” But one made a secret pact, a private promise; he sealed the fate of his friends as well as his own, and even past that, to those attached by association or circumstance. So many lives were held accountable to one man’s promise, and I still got to the end and can’t say where there is an enemy. That’s the thing that tore me up, that SGJ wrote in a way that hit me right between the eyes like a freaking brick; the debt has to paid, sorry isn’t enough, and I can mourn both sides. There are many elements present in this novel, this is one that made the book that touch more horrific to me, kept my mind from resting, gave my pulse that little drop and catch, and coupled with that ending, led to my liberating, messy and over the top cry fest at the end. 10/10 am going to do it again.

[theyodamom · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Freaking Frightening Stuff. A wonderful mix of Native Culture and Karma Nightmares. I tell you what I'm so happy to be a vegetarian who has never killed an animal. This wicked is not playing games, it's pissed and has no fear and hides in plain sight. Gods what a wonderful novel. I love a get what you give story :P Karma baby. Audiobook (perfect narrator)

[ridgewaygirl · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a literary novel that uses the framework of horror, or maybe it's a horror novel that is just very well-written and features well-developed characters and a vivid setting. In any case, Jones is an excellent author whose books I will now seek out. There are four teenage boys who go hunting one day, trespassing into the part of the reservation where only elder Blackfeet are allowed to hunt. What transpires sticks with them to varying degrees, but it's some years later, when they are all adults, that the consequences manifest themselves. This isn't the kind of horror novel where there's a central character that you know will make it out alive. Jones opts instead to make each of his characters fully realized, which increases the impact of the things that happen. I'd like to go into what Jones is doing here, but this is a book best entered into without any idea of what happens. It's worth reading, though. I'd go into how Jones has written a novel about what it is to live as a Blackfeet living both on a reservation and outside among non-Native Americans and it's fascinating for that alone, but there's also a fast-paced plot and some scary stuff, too, with a strong ending, but I don't want to give anything away.

[out1and1about · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Read for bookriot #readharder challenge. Number 24, Native American author.

I enjoyed the story tremendously. Slow build, but some scenes were definitely scary, and the overall premise was unique enough to be worth the read.

I wanted to understand the characters more. It was a short book with a lot of key characters so not much room to really attach yourself to them. But likable enough and a good peek into life as a Native American.

I didn’t like the slips into second person either. I understand it was likely to make you feel for the “villain” but it was done so sporadically and suddenly that it only succeeded in pulling me out of the story.

I would definitely recommend to anyone looking for a Native American spooky contemporary story.