Love Medicine. By Louise Erdrich. First Edition, First Printing. Holt, Rinehart, Winston. New York, 1984.

Louise Erdrich has steadily published exceptional fiction over the last four decades. Yet her recognition as one of the best American writers of the era has been slow to follow. Literary awards seemed to elude her despite praise from critics and readers alike. In the last 10 years, however, she has won both the National Book Award for Fiction and the Pulitzer Prize, and literary historians are at once placing her (rightfully so) among America’s greatest writers. Such elevation should have been evident from the onset, though. Her first novel, Love Medicine, was an immediate success. It all but guaranteed her a writer’s life. It surpassed commercial expectations and won the National Book Critics Circle Award. It is composed of several interconnected stories about Ojibwe families living on fictional reservations called Little No Horse and Hoopdance. It remains one of Erdrich’s best works.

This first edition, first printing is in fine condition. In the original quarter cloth, very nearly fine with only fading to edges. Text block fine. In the original dust jacket, fine.

A fine first edition of Erdrich’s first novel.