Hi Everyone,

Here are some early pre-publication reviews of REZ LIFE. Very pleased.

from BOOKLIST:

Advanced Review – Uncorrected Proof

Rez Life: An Indian's Journey through Reservation Life.

Treuer, David (Author) Feb 2012. 352 p. Atlantic Monthly, hardcover, $26.00. (9780802119711). 978.

Treuer (The Translation of Dr. Apelles, 2006), an Ojibwe who grew up on the Leech Lake Reservation in Minnesota, has written eloquently about the contemporary Native American experience in his three novels. In this brilliant amalgam of historical research and personal memoir, he presents a compelling and elucidating discourse on how reservations began, and what he sees for their future. The modern reservation was born, he says, with the Indian Appropriation Act of 1851, when government policy involved "containment and removal." Even so, "contained" tribes still held rights from earlier treaties to hunt, fish, and harvest timber on their ceded territory, leading to multiple court rulings over the years. Treuer enlivens his historical discussions of these issues—as well as Indian housing, mandatory Indian boarding schools, Indian activism, and the multiple effects of casinos—with present-day interviews with friends, family, teachers, BIA officials, lawyers, and tribal-court judges. No mere litany of Native American achievements and losses over the past 150 years, Treuer's account reads like a novel, brimming with characters, living and dead, who bring his tribe's history to life.

— Deborah Donovan

FROM KIRKUS: REZ LIFE

An Indian's Journey Through Reservation Life

Author: Treuer, David

Review Issue Date: November 15, 2011

Online Publish Date: November 7, 2011

Publisher:Atlantic Monthly

Pages: 368

Price ( Hardcover ): $26.00

Publication Date: January 31, 2012

ISBN ( Hardcover ): 978-0-8021-1971-1

Category: Nonfiction

In a book that is part memoir, part journalistic exposé and part cultural history, novelist Treuer (The Translation of Dr. Apelles, 2008, etc.) offers a movingly plainspoken account of reservation life.

The author intertwines stories of growing up on the shores of the Lake Leech Ojibwe reservation in Minnesota with those of the Ojibwe people and other Native American tribes. Treuer writes that "[m]ost often rez life is associated with tragedy"; at the same time, he notes that it is also shot through with pride and a profound love of tradition. Alternating between personal recollections of unforgettable "rez" personalities—e.g., tribal police officers, rice-gatherers and fishermen—and sharp-eyed historical analyses of events in Native American history, the author sheds light on aspects of Indian culture closed to most non-Natives. He speaks candidly about the "comforting trouble" he finds at the heart of his own mixed-race family and the perennial problems of alcoholism, poverty and crime facing reservation dwellers everywhere. Treuer also delves into the issues surrounding Native American sovereignty and treaty rights, examining the inhumane—and sometimes genocidal—government policies that have led to the systematic abuse, exploitation and disenfranchisement of Native Americans. The author soundly critiques tribal governments as well, focusing in particular on the corruption and cronyism that characterizes so many of them. For most of these entities, "there is no balance of power; on the contrary power is very much out of balance." That Treuer is one of a few Native Americans to have made it out of the "rez" only adds to the book's poignancy. He examines a culture that is in crisis, but persists, even thrives, with enduring grit and courage.

Powerful, important reading.

Sadly–I couldn't upload the wonderful PW review and Q and A but they were (both) great.