The Dance House: Stories from Rosebud

Lakota Sioux historian and novelist Marshall (Winter of the Holy Iron) proves himself a triple threat with these powerful essays and short stories. As the subtitle suggests, the nine pieces collected here all deal with life on the author's home reservation of Rosebud in South Dakota, and it is a credit to Marshall's ability as a storyteller that the fictional stories are nearly indistinguishable from the factual essays. Subject to changes brought in by the Euro-American culture that surrounds it, Marshall's Rosebud is nevertheless a timeless place where the Sioux insist on maintaining their identity. In the title piece, when the federal government seeks to break up the reservation, the old dance house is burned, but a new one replaces it ""as a place to be happy"" and remember ""the old days and traditional ways."" Readers will be grateful to Marshall for building a dance house of the mind, one that draws on autobiography, nature writing, legend and the day-to-day adventures and misadventures of his own family and neighbors. (July)