Hanta Yo: An American Saga

Hanta Yo #1 - 4

by Ruth Beebe Hill

Partially based on fact, this multigenerational saga follows the lives of two Indian families, members of the Mahto band of the Teton Sioux, before the arrival of the white man

Genres: Historical Fiction, Fiction, Native American, Westerns, Historical, Native Americans, Indigenous

834 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1979

About the author

Ruth Beebe Hill was born in Cleveland, OH to Hermann C. and Flora M. Beebe during April, 1913. In 1935 she graduated with a B.A. from Western Reserve University and pursued graduate studies there in 1936-37. In 1939-40 Hill studied at the University of Colorado. In 1940 she married Burroughs Reid Hill; together they had one son, Reid. Hill currently resides in San Juan Island, WA.. She was first a member of the promotion department at Books and Authors, Inc., Los Angeles, CA (1949-1955), then a news and feature writer with the Newport-Balboa Press, Newport Beach, CA (1950-52). Hill also served as Co-founder of the Women's Auxiliary California Institute for Cancer Research. Throughout her life she has and continues to lecture at Universities and seminars across the country. In addition to her best selling novel Hanta Yo, she was the author of a monthly column for Western Life Magazine, 1967-68. In 1979 Hill received the Golden Plate Award from American Academy of Achievement. Hill was 66 at the time Hanta Yo was published by Doubleday (1979), although she began work on the thirty-year project beginning in 1951. From the time she was young she had a passion for Native Americans. From 1951-1954, Hill buried herself in local libraries preparing for her novel. She finally came to the conclusion that library research was not sufficient for her cause and left to travel Native American Reservations. She spoke with/interviewed over a thousand Native Americans. Her intention was to gain first hand experience in a Native American environment and she spent much of her time, not only speaking with the natives, but observing the land in order to absorb the influence on the culture. In a Smithsonian article she discussed her experiences and warned: "If you go with a camera and a notebook, you might as well not go. You can count on being turned over-like inquiring anthropologists-to the biggest liar around. You want a legend? You'll get a legend. And it's all crap!" Chunksa Yuha, a bilingual Native American musician, entered the project during the last fourteen years. Yuha assisted Hill in the discovery of the Native American "soul." She committed herself to learn the Native American language, Dakotah (Lakotah) with Yuha as her instructor. The fact that he had been withheld from "white schooling" as a youngster made him a valuable resource in her studies. He regurgitated information, some of which had been suppressed for as many as two hundred yeas. "Hanta Yo," meaning "clear the way" in Dakotah, tells the story of a small tribe of Teton Souix which resisted white influence during the time between 1750-1834. Hill's concern with the elimination and corruption of the Native American culture by the "white" conception of America is the dominant pretext for this story. Hanta Yo, Hill's only book, is more a life work than a novel. Her desire produce this text obviously emerged from a sincere passion rather than a desire for success and recognition.

Reviews

[Kimberly · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my all time favorite book. I read it back in the late 80's and have been ruined for a good fiction book ever since. I compare every book I ever read to this one and 99.99% of them fall short.

The story of how the book came to be written is fascinating in itself. For those of you that don't know, this book is an actual history of a tribe of Lakota, Sioux. It seems that many years ago an elder in the tribe had a 100-winter count. These were pieces of leather/animal skins with drawings that recorded significant events of the tribe that year. The elder greatly wanted to find someone who would help him bridge the gap of understanding between the white man and the Sioux and his idea was to write a book, using the 100 year count of his tribe. And so the elder began started searching for an author. But most of the authors that came to him wanted a “tell it to me” story where they merely acted as a scribble. None of the authors showed a passion or genuine interest in learning the Sioux ways or of being the instrument of understanding between the white man and the Sioux nation.

Finally, after a very long search Ruth Beebe Hill came to the elder, interested in writing the story of the 100 winter count, and she stayed on to live with the tribe. She lived with them for years. She learned their language, participated in all of their ceremonies, lived as they lived, studied with them, and was eventually adopted by them. Her loves for the Sioux was evident in her commitment to truly understand them.

This is one of the most beautiful books I have ever read. If you are Native American or just want to know more about them, this book is a must read!!!

You will laugh, cry, gasp, and be blown away by this true story. Ruth Beebe Hill succeeds beyond belief with this book.

[Clif · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this paperback in a box of old books left by a neighbor who moved away.

Over 1100 pages long, it truly is a saga and, in the manner of Moby Dick, transports the reader into the details of a kind of life never again to be lived, not with dry details but through a vivid story.

Following the life of a character from his birth to his death, nothing is held back about the culture of the Lakotah (Sioux to the white man) who were masters of the Great Plains near the Black Hills until the coming of the Anglo.

The reader is invited into the thoughts and practices, the history and politics of both intra and inter-tribal life. Looking intimately into sex, friendship, child rearing, hunting, warfare, horse training, family dynamics and many more aspects of Native-American life, this book presents a fascinating account of a sustainable way to live, though it was filled with adversity and sexual inequality.

The account is based on an actual series of events known from a "winter count"; a hide upon which was drawn the major events for a band of the tribe. Author Ruth Beebe Hill had to flesh out the novel from this spare framework, doing so cooperatively with a native Lakotah, intending to create the world of the Sioux in such depth that readers can begin to experience a completely different outlook than that of Western culture.

Those who look for an account of Indian - Anglo conflict will be disappointed. All but the last 10% of the book occurs without reference to Anglos and, even there, it is the indirect effect of cultural contact that proves important.

Hill educates us by having her characters ask the questions that we would like to have answered. What is the reason for a certain practice, sungazing, for example? Characters in the book will think about it each in their own way and by doing so we gain some understanding of it from different angles. Effortlessly the reader is drawn in and soon feels a part of events.

We learn that there are no contradictions to the Lakotah. We learn that there is nothing un-natural and that when one doesn't understand something it remains a mystery until a teacher comes along to set the conditions up so that one can answer the question for himself. What is the thing we moderns know as a thunderstorm? It is the "flying mystery".

What is most important? The truth. No one's word is accepted without question, a witness must testify that what is said is true. Only the scout who must of necessity travel alone will speak of what he has seen without this need for a witness.

The imagery of the seasons and the moves of the band that accompany them are vivid. I couldn't help but conclude the book with a sense of loss. The way of looking at the world and being in the world that the "Indians" knew passed away so recently and can never be recovered. We simply don't think that way now.

If you enjoyed the movie Dances With Wolves as I did, you will find Hanta Yo a wonderful way to fill out that glimpse of native-American life

[Sandy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was recommended by my sister Sue who read every book on Native Americans she could find. Hanto Yo was her hands down favorite and she convinced me to read it. Although not a topic I was originally interested in, within a few pages I was hooked, hoping never to leave this wonderful world. Hanta Yo should be read by all Americans, as invaders who destroyed a way of life of an entire continent of people, we owe them, at the very least the understanding of what they lost. This is not a sad book of loss though, this is an exciting book of life. It is one of my all time favorite books.

[Marlene · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read Hanta Yo over twenty years ago and just recently read it again. It's like entering a world that holds such poetry and beauty it almost hurts. There is a rhythm to both the words and the story, one almost feels as though they are being rocked in a mother's arms and being told a legend. Among my top five lifetime reads.

[George · Rating 1 out of 5]

No more reading books by people who pretend to be Indians or telling truthful stories about Indians. No more members of the "Wannabe" tribe.
I read this book when it came out. Then, after reading about the movie to be made from it, I realized that this supposedly historically real book was little more than fiction, full of material that had appeared in movies and elsewhere, but there was no historical truth in it.
But I had also let myself be deceived by the Carlos Castenada books about the purported Yaqui sorcerer. Castaneda was exposed as a fraud and his academic life ended, although he had been made very wealthy by foolish readers like me. I should have listened to my friend, a sociologist/ethnographer who warned me against Castenada.
Ruth Beebe Hill made good money from this book, and as a book it's readable and a bit long, but no more than that. The interest for me came from my expectation that it was a true story. It is not. It is only fiction. Check up on it yourself in Wikipedia if you choose.

[Werner]

This is another book which has set on my "started-not-finished" shelf for years with no explanation; and in this case, the implication probably isn't fair to the book (which has a pretty high average rating on Goodreads). If I'd begun reading this just to myself, I'd probably have finished it. However, it was one which, back in the late 80s, I started reading out loud as a shared read with Barb. Admittedly, it's long, and fairly slow-paced, at least in the beginning chapters which we read. She wasn't really getting into it; and when she learned that it's a multi-generational saga, and that my impression was that at the point where we were in the book, the main protagonist was not yet born, she suggested pulling the plug on it. At that juncture, I wasn't invested enough to continue reading by myself.

In the years since, I've sometimes considered going back and reading it, just to complete a loose end. I don't doubt that I'd find it a worthy book; but the over 800-page length is daunting, especially at my age (68 now), and there are so many other books on my to-read shelf --some of them equally long-- that are higher priorities. So I think this will just remain a "might have been." (My initial attraction to the book was a desire to read some fiction about the Plains Indians, from their perspective. Barb and I subsequently discovered Don Coldsmith's Spanish Bit Saga, and went on to read 13 of the books, though I've only reviewed a couple here; we really liked those. So what I initially wanted from this book has actually been satisfied from a different source.)

[Deyanne · Rating 3 out of 5]

I just saw this novel on another Goodreads list and I must admit, I was flooded with memories. I think it was published in the 80's. At the time, my husband was fascinated with everything Native American. Partly to honor him and to have something to discuss together, I recommended it for a book group (which is still in existence). The friends in this club have never let me forget this choice. They strongly disliked it, and not one of them finished it. Granted, it was long. Granted, it rambled. Granted, it had plenty of controversy dealing with authenticity.

I remember the fervor more than I do the book. I recall liking the beginning, but I felt it needed a really good editor. That is as much as I recall, but I am gentle on myself realizing that this was almost forty years ago. Funny, it is still on my bookshelf. No. I don't plan to reread it.

[Jonna · Rating 5 out of 5]

If I could give this book more than 5 stars, I would. This book came out in the '80's, I believe, long before "The Last of the Mohicans" and "Dances with Wolves" wove their way into our American culture. This book is, I think, is over 1,000 pages and every one of them sings. Hill masterfully tells the story of the Plains Indians and follows one tribe in particular. You learn the mores of the tribe, the ins and outs of their culture and way of life. It is a fascinating read and I loved the book so much that I have re-read it twice. Something I rarely do with ANY book. So don't be taken aback by the size of the book. Welcome it - for once you open the book to the first page, you will be off on the journey of a lifetime; one that won't soon be forgotten! Happy Reading!

[Terri H · Rating 5 out of 5]

I stumbled across this book by accident when it was first published. I had always felt an affinity for Native American culture so I was a motivated reader and struggled through the constant going back to see how something was pronounced or what it meant. It took a long time to read because of that.

It was worth it!

In the preface it talks about how the author lived with the tribe and heard the stories firsthand. She found someone who was willing to help her write the book so that she did it right. They translated everything from native dialect to English and back to native dialect to ensure not only the translation was correct, the essence of the meanings were accurately conveyed.

They succeeded.

To compare this book to any movie or other fictional account would be to trivialize it. This book is an EXPERIENCE and, for me, a life-altering tale that not only deepens my respect for the culture of this band of Sioux, it affirms how little we knew about "savage natives" and how that philosophy altered our fate as a nation in ways we have still never understood.

[Jeff · Rating 1 out of 5]

It's quite remarkable that the general public continues to heap adulation on the mawkish and fictionalized Hanta Yo - a book completely discredited by scholars including the eminent Vine Deloria Jr. Please read "God is Red" to understand why this book offends so many indigenous people.

[TBML · Rating 3 out of 5]

Before Jean M. Auel and her The Clan of the Cave Bear ; before Kathleen O'Neal Gear & W. Michael Gear and their The People of the... series there was Ruth Beebe Hill and her Hanta Yo . It depicts the daily life of three generations of two families that were part of the Mahto band of the Teton Sioux from about 1750-1834 C.E.

Die hard purists among aficionados of Westerns will probably object to my placing it in "their" genre; the same may hold true, to a lesser de-gree, for fans of historical fiction. And, indeed, these opinions have considerable merit. Typical Westerns feature cowboys, gunfights, strong men, adventure, death; what an acquaintance of mine calls "horseshit and gunsmoke." That is absent here. Instead Hill presents the Native American (in her day the term was "Indian") side of the story. But there are enough adventures and strong characters here to satisfy the most hardened devotees of L'Amour, Zane Grey and their like. Other critics contend that Hill does not present an entirely accurate picture of life among the Sioux and for them historical fiction needs to be accurate. I see merit in this argument as well.

However, Hill does write a compelling story. Even though it runs toover 800 pages, I remember being captivated the whole time I was reading it. For capturing and holding my attention, I would give this book 4 stars. For historical accuracy, I'd rate it at probably a 2.5-3 (if the critics are correct.)For editorial control over a long winded author, I award 2 stars. That only increases my incredulity that my attention almost neer wandered, though. This book could have been half the length it is (even at that, it would have been long!) without anny diminution of the story's power.

In brief, cirtics allege that Hill failed to portray Teton Sioux social structure correctly and question both the truth and(even granting that) the validity /utility of how she claims she wrote it. Hill claimed it was translated from modern English into an archaic Lakotah dialect and then back into the English of the 1806 Webster's Dictionsary to give it authenticity to her portrayal of the tenor and flavor of the times.

Whether you believe her, or agree with such efforts, this, the only novel she ever wrote is a monumental accomplishment of story telling.
--Mark Pendleton

Click here to find the book in our library.

[Herman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hanta Yo, Move I come in a spiritual way, (How come the jokester in me want too start singing Ludacris “Move Bitch get out da way). So I feel great that I was able to read this like 800 pages, OMG it took forever, this is not a simple read. Almost a foundation work of native plains culture, this was really well researched. Something like thirty years the writer worked on this one book. It shows in the length, it shows in the details, it shows in almost every line written here. Unlike most any other story I’ve read this one has the tempo of a Russian winter novel slow and steady and long. It gives a high def description of thirty years of Dakota/Lakota society. Following mainly just a couple of families as they go from generation to generation adjusting to new realities as white society starts to invade the world of the Lakota changing it forever starting the people on their death march. I find it hard to believe that for a time in the late 1970’s this book was on the best sellers list. I find it hard to believe because one it’s too long, two it’s kind of depressing, and three it’s a really difficult read. I mean I’ve read 70 books on Native American Culture and much of this book was new ground to me. There is a lot of Lakota language in this and ceremony, and the best description of an initi ceremony I’ve ever read, some controversy about some ancient ceremonial practices that are not done any longer but it sure does get some people upset if a white author starts to give voice and description to a ancient ceremony all sorts of butt-hurt feelings over these descriptions I can tell you, I wonder if the best seller status was achieved because of, or in spite of these controversies. Anyway there is no two-spirit ceremony and no female eating of the afterbirth, that I know of but I grant that at one time there might have been. Outside of those two large controversies this was and is a great piece of literature just don’t ask me to read it again. Three starts I want to give it four stars for just the research but I have to say in the end the writing was not as good as what the story deserves. It was a large slice of life thirty years of plains drama. The book feels in part like a French new wave movie of the 1960’s it feels fragmented, discontinuous and questions that arise in the book are not really answered in the end creating a feeling of ambiguity. So while I enjoyed the book I’m not so sure about the writing and the ending is kind of a let down.

[Christina Carson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was truly one of the most revealing books about the nature of the North American Native worldview I've ever read. The author not only had to learn the language, but also the conceptual framework from which the language arose, one completely different from the subject-object view that frames our language and understanding of the world. This was an enormous undertaking, yet the only way someone from outside a culture could authentically portray a foreign culture, its values and how they arose.I will be forever grateful to Chunksa Yuha whose dream this was and Ruth Beebe Hill, the woman who made it possible to relate the history of the Teton Sioux in their voice and conceptual understanding of interrelatedness such that someone from our culture, a world defined by the relationship "I-thou", can begin to fathom how this other way of seeing the world appears in day-to-day human interactions and the implications of it.

[Joseph Carrabis · Rating 1 out of 5]

I got Hanto Yo so long ago the bookmark in it had a date on it: 7 Aug 1981. I remember attempting it three times. I think I got to page 100 once, so maybe one-eighth of the way through.
I picked it up again recently determined to get through it. I did. It was work. And not worth it.
Hanta Yo came out when the US was experiencing yet another dive into non-christian spiritualities. Anything not directly referencing Jesus or Holy Mother Church had to be good. People experimented with Kabbalah, Buddha, worked at becoming bodhisattvas, busted their butts i-Chinging, it was a fascinating time.
The book is in English working real had to get what somebody thought were the cadences of Lakotah (maybe?).
Didn't work.
And the book's attempt to invoke Plains People philosophies doesn't work.
But if you're a wannabe, this is the book for you.

[Ander Sundell · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was basically forced upon me by my father, which is a rare thing. Book pushing is usually my mother's thing. He gave me the preface that it is not an easy read but it is worth it. The language is a bit hard to follow at first but then the problems dissolve. If I remember correctly it was written in the native Lakotah and then translated to English. I find myself bringing up things from this book all the time, just yesterday I was telling someone a story from it. Be it fact or fiction or some combination of the two, this book really filled me in on Native American life. It has a bit of everything, war, peace, love, deception, working life, honor, man.....what can I say, my pops was right.

[D Steven Ledingham · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is hands down one of the best historical fictions of the native (First people) I have ever read. I believe it is out of print and I've worn out two copies in my lifetime. Translated from English into Dakotah/Lakotah dialect then back into English. Contains a listing of idiomatic phrases in the end of the book that is really helpful. Simply one of the best books to gain insight into the lifestyle and spiritual nature of the Lakotah. I cannot recommend this book highly enough.

[Kristina · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a powerful book. I have read this book 4 times. Hill had this translated into Soiux and back to english to capture the wonderful idioms. (cunning red dog=fox) and it makes for a unique feel to the book. Not a glamourous time in history for America, but such a rich cultural snapshot.

[George Fowler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beyond good. Beyond evaluation. By all accounts, authentic. Deeply moving.

[Cody · Rating 5 out of 5]

Personally, I really enjoyed this. It was paced rather slowly but a lot happens in the last 30 pages or so. I found the story interesting and it is refreshing to read a book almost exclusively about Native Americans just doing their thing, not constantly in conflict with white people or suffering under colonialist oppression. I found that made the occasions where they did come into contact with white people very impactful and appropriately tragic. I don't know a lot about the Dakotah peoples, however, so I can't say how culturally accurate it is. Overall I felt this was kind of like a novel of manners, only instead of it being about British people it was about Dakotah people.

[Nicola Pierce · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just finished this not five minutes ago, the first novel I've read in months and months. Over a thousand pages of pure magic. I had never heard of this book and am so grateful for discovering it in the published diary of Anne Truitt, 'The Journal of an Artist'.

Wonderfully compelling, beautifully written and imagined, and it also felt a real privilege to step inside this world of the Teton Sioux - before everything fell apart. It took twenty-five years of research and it shows. Just glorious and heart-breaking and life-affirming. Can't recommend it highly enough.

[Jeff · Rating 5 out of 5]

A remarkable book. Probably the greatest work of cultural anthropology ever penned: sympathetic, detailed, sometimes brutal, prosaic and brilliant. A difficult book to read, as comprehending and understanding a different culture in a different time and place is really, really hard. I picked it up in Heathrow in 1980, started to (re) read whilst hiking the AT, the finished pages fueling my campfires and finished during a rainstorm upon the cusp of Fall.

[Rick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ruth Beebe Hill’s Hanta Yo is a noteworthy rendering of Native American history…historical fiction to be sure but how much history and how much fiction? From today’s viewpoint, of course, we view most everything about the Indian Nation through the lenses of the white man … which gives us a different perspective and language. Original records from Native Americans predating the incursion of the white man are practically nonexistent, at least records we can understand. While there are some drawings and other ephemera available, the Indian left little in terms of a written record from these early times. One of Hill’s resources for Hanta Yo was a document called “winter counts.”

Winter counts were pieces of rawhide that were updated annually in order to record that a year had elapsed and on which at least one Sioux band of American Indians would record in pictographs the most important events (floods, meteors, epidemics) its group experienced that year. Accumulating winter counts that predated the Civil War, Hill pieced together a culture of a particular band of Sioux Indians. Hill collaborated with a full-blooded Sioux descendant who helped with the ancient language and dialects. Hill’s approach is to immerse the reader in the culture of a Teton Sioux band of Indians across three generations. The difficulty of course is using our words to express their culture … a challenging undertaking.

Hill writes with a sing-song pace that quickly becomes easy on the mind. Her epic follows two Indian males as they progress through four stages of life – Child, Youth, Warrior, and Legend. Her chronicle touches on the steps most men pass – finding ones position in the band hierarchy, taking a wife, having children, naming a child, and becoming a leader. She also illustrates tribal life where members – select occupations (warrior, hunter, farmer, security), choose holy men, decide upon seasonal migrations, and create an ebb and flow as family units cluster together (forming lodges, bands, hoops, tribes). Lastly she delves into some of the more momentous events that shaped the Indian way of life – the arrival of firesticks and crazy-water (guns and whiskey), the appearance of the white man and the common diseases he unknowingly brought, etc.

This book is big and sprawling, much like the great west … but on many different levels it seems to work. It is a weighty tome at a bit over 800 pages and requires an investment in ones’ time, but the narrative draws and the pages fly by, the reader coming back with pleasure to the storyline time after time. The tale also keeps its momentum, not wavering or slowing toward the end. In its depictions of Indian life Hanta Yo has a lot of spiritual overtones, a little bit Dances With Wolves and a little bit The Teachings of Don Juan: A Yaqui Way of Knowledge. In the end, Hanta Yo is the exploration of a vanished way of life.

This novel is the only one to be published by Ruth Beebe Hill, and this a 25 year effort supposedly. The study of Native American culture was her life’s work and interest. Her book endeavors to reveal a previously hidden life of Sioux Indians … yet her work did not meet with a welcome reception by Native American writers and historians of Indian history. But then the Indian nation oftentimes seems a better critic of others work than publisher of their own interpretive material. While Hanta Yo may not be perfect, it remains a persuasive work until something with more authority comes up.

[Dsinglet · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have now read this book three times. Each time I appreciate it more. It transports the reader into a time and culture that existed in North America long before the Europeans arrived.

It is an in depth look at the way of life of the Dakota tribe on the Great Plains including everyday life, warfare, hunting and pursuit of the highest ideals and spiritual mysteries. It shows a culture which respects individual choice above all else. Leaders could be heard and followed or ignored. It was the right of each person to decide.

It brings the people up to the time whites began to appear and bring disease and problems. It follows a true line of events set down by those who recorded "yearly counts". These record keepers drew significant events onto tipi covers.

Ms BebeHill worked with a Dakota who still spoke the language. They translated the book into Dakota and back into English so that phrasing was authentic, as well as details. In later years she has been much criticized by modern day Lakotas for misrepresenting facts. This book remains spellbinding and full of life.

[Donna · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my all time favorites! I was very glad it was a very thick (long) book because I did not want this one to end. I was immersed into a culture that is very different from today's and could not help but regret some of the beliefs that have been lost. I have reread this a few times and enjoyed it as much as the first time. It reminds me of Shogun because I get more and different details with each reading. Highly recommended!!!

[Carol Kinisky-balina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent - one of the best books I have ever read in my 72 years! Lent out my original copy and had a difficult time getting another. Finally visiting someone in Arizona, this Canadian (from Thunder Bay, Ontario - about 350 miles north of Minneapolis) was able to replace my copy. What joy! This book has so many "scenes" indelibly etched on my mind, I occasionally still think of them or tell others about them. I read that so my research went into this book that she wrote no other although I don't know if that's true. In any case, one of my all-time favourites.

[Mich · Rating 5 out of 5]

When I read on the jacket of this book that it took the writer 25 years to write the story, I had to read it. It covers three generations in the life of Lakota/Dakota/Siouan native people, the generation before the arrival of the settlers, the generation during the influx of settlers, and the generation after the land was settled. This book effected my life in that I was amazed by the history in it and it set me off reading history books for about the next ten years.

[inspirational yinyang · Rating 5 out of 5]

A brilliant saga written with authenticity and lucidity about the Lakota. "Habitual spiritual consciousness" as set forth by the author is the theme and connecting thread of all characters in the story. It's an amazing book, full of light and consciousness. The saga is told from a Lakota point of view, written by a woman who lived among them and learned their ways. The saga is based on true events. Open your mind and get ready to be taken to an older, more adventurous world.

[Melina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hanta Yo is truly one of my favorites. The author certainly did her homework with the native language and meanings. The book was beautiful yet, at the same time, sad and touching. The sorrow that comes with the inevitable loss of the culture of indigenous people's for the sake of "progress and civilization".

[Neryl · Rating 5 out of 5]

Historically accurate, 25 years of research, 2 years of learning language, only 1078 pages! Will take me many moons to finish. Paperback print very small & pages thin,so I've ordered hardback.Not always going to be easy reading due to culture at time. Ms Hill was selected by a Dakota . Read intro & glossary then just read it Years 1750-1835

[Angela Graves · Rating 5 out of 5]

The MOST beautiful book I've ever read. The whole book is like a prayer.