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Cash Blackbear Mysteries #2
Girl Gone Missing
Nineteen-year-old Cash Blackbear helps law enforcement solve the mysterious disappearance of a local girl from Minnesota's Red River Valley.
1970s, Fargo-Moorhead: it’s the tail end of the age of peace and love, but Cash Blackbear isn’t feeling it. Bored by her freshman classes at Moorhead State College, Cash just wants to play pool, learn judo, chain-smoke, and be left alone. But when one of Cash’s classmates vanishes without a trace, Cash, whose dreams have revealed dangerous realities in the past, can’t stop envisioning terrified girls begging for help. Things become even more intense when an unexpected houseguest starts crashing in her living room: a brother she didn’t even know was alive, from whom she was separated when they were taken from the Ojibwe White Earth Reservation as children and forced into foster care.
When Sheriff Wheaton, her guardian and friend, asks for Cash’s help with the case of the missing girl, she must override her apprehension about leaving her hometown—and her rule to never get in somebody else’s car—in order to discover the truth about the girl’s whereabouts. Can she get to her before it’s too late?
1970s, Fargo-Moorhead: it’s the tail end of the age of peace and love, but Cash Blackbear isn’t feeling it. Bored by her freshman classes at Moorhead State College, Cash just wants to play pool, learn judo, chain-smoke, and be left alone. But when one of Cash’s classmates vanishes without a trace, Cash, whose dreams have revealed dangerous realities in the past, can’t stop envisioning terrified girls begging for help. Things become even more intense when an unexpected houseguest starts crashing in her living room: a brother she didn’t even know was alive, from whom she was separated when they were taken from the Ojibwe White Earth Reservation as children and forced into foster care.
When Sheriff Wheaton, her guardian and friend, asks for Cash’s help with the case of the missing girl, she must override her apprehension about leaving her hometown—and her rule to never get in somebody else’s car—in order to discover the truth about the girl’s whereabouts. Can she get to her before it’s too late?
208 pages, Kindle Edition
First published May 14, 2019
199 people are currently reading
3390 people want to read
About the author
Marcie R. Rendon
18 books988 followersMarcie R. Rendon is an enrolled member of the White Earth Anishinabe Nation. She is a mother, grandmother, writer, and performance artist. A recipient of the Loft's Inroads Writers of Color Award for Native Americans, she studied under Anishinabe author Jim Northrup. Her first children's book is Pow Wow Summer (Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2014). Murder on the Red River is her debut novel.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 552 reviews
August 25, 2020
Cash has enrolled in college and is struggling to balance campus life, with her work driving a farm truck and her nights hustling a pool table. Adding to her woes, her brother who she hasn't seen since they were separated by the state and put into foster care has shown up on her doorstep after a tour in Viet Nam.
When a girl from college goes missing everyone thinks she has run away to the city. But Cash is having dreams and in them the girl is crying out for help.
The Cash Blackbear mysteries are what I would call important books. They are brilliantly written gritty crime fiction, but they are also much more than that. Woven into the narrative are important lessons that everyone should hear.
When a girl from college goes missing everyone thinks she has run away to the city. But Cash is having dreams and in them the girl is crying out for help.
The Cash Blackbear mysteries are what I would call important books. They are brilliantly written gritty crime fiction, but they are also much more than that. Woven into the narrative are important lessons that everyone should hear.
June 29, 2022
Sharon aimed at the seven ball. “Did you hear about that chick who disappeared from Dahl Hall? Kids are saying maybe she got pregnant and went home. Then someone said she hitchhiked down to the Cities, but she hasn’t come back. Her parents were at the Dean’s office this morning.”
I subscribe to Raven Reads (a quarterly surprise goodie box that contains Indigenous books and merchandise), so it’s out of my control if I’m sent a book that doesn’t really match my reading tastes. Girl Gone Missing is billed as a Mystery (in the “Gone Girl on the Train” fashion) — which probably wouldn’t grab my attention these days — and while author Marcie R. Rendon has created a really interesting main character in amateur sleuth Renee “Cash” Blackbear, as the second book in a series, I ended up playing a lot of catch up with her back story…and not really enjoying the mystery. I want to acknowledge that after reading the Author’s Note at the end, I can appreciate what Rendon was trying to share with her audience about both the scourge of missing Indigenous women and the lingering trauma for those Indigenous children who were raised in abusive white foster homes — and it’s for these insights that I love my reading subscription and did find interest in this novel — but this is not really in my wheelhouse and others have enjoyed it more; perhaps take my review with a grain of salt and pick it up yourself.
Cash leafed through the dresses as if they were pages of a book. Images flashed through her mind as she touched each one: A classroom full of laughing kids. A dance at the Legion Hall. A church choir singing loudly. She touched a soft blue wool sweater — goose bumps ran up her arm. She shivered and saw a girl floating over a dirt field calling, “Help me.”
From the first page, we realise that Cash (an enrolled member of the White Earth Chippewa Nation) has dreams and waking visions that might be helpful in solving crimes. We eventually learn that she was raised in a series of abusive foster families, and after a local sheriff rescued her and set her up in an apartment in Fargo — and encouraged the bright young woman to use a government program to enrol in Moorhead State college across the Red River in Minnesota — she is now, reluctantly, enduring her first semester of higher education. Cash spends her days in class, her evenings driving a dump truck for the local farmers’ beet harvest, and her spare time smoking Marlboros, drinking Bud, and practising her pool skills at the local dive bar. When a local girl goes missing, the sheriff, Wheaton, enlists Cash’s help in finding her.
The story is set in the Seventies and the streets are filled with bell-bottomed Free Love hippies, shell-shocked Vietnam vets, and long-braided members of the nascent American Indian Movement. Despite a really challenging personal history, Cash seems a bit naive about the real world — people explain to her what a pimp is and confirm that the Grain Exchange that’s she’s heard about on the radio is a real place in “the Cities” down South — but even so, when called upon, Cash will put herself in danger to help others.
He looked at her and smiled, a smile that reached his eyes. “Good one,” was all he said. It was enough — but not quite enough to fill the enormous void created by all of the losses she’d had during her short lifetime. But she kept those feelings from her eyes and grinned back at Wheaton.
Again: The mystery element was pretty straightforward and solved easily, but as Rendon explains in her Author’s Note, she wanted to have Cash help look for some missing white girls in order to highlight the plight of “missing, murdered, and unwanted women everywhere” and demonstrate the character’s generosity in showing concern for people who were not from her own community; a lesson we could all learn in the face of the disproportionate number of Indigenous women who disappear across North America. And that’s worth reading about.
March 14, 2025
I sped through this book much like the first, I'm anticipating I'll finish the next two by the end of the week, and then I won't know what to do with myself until more books come out.
I really appreciate the focus the author put on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, there aren't nearly enough books doing the same.
This time around, Cash gets drawn into yet another case, and helps solve it in her own, unique, way.
Girl Gone Missing was even sadder than Murder on the Red River, some scenes near the end in particular, which made me want to take a break from listening. Luckily though, everything turned out okay and we got a little preview of what we can expect in the next book.
The mystery was still kind of in the background, and the story mostly focuses on Cash, but I like that, it's a nice change of pace from your average detective novel. We also saw Long Braids again, which is a huge plus for me, I'm hoping he'll become a "true" love interest, so we can see him more often.
Onwards to book three!!
I really appreciate the focus the author put on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, there aren't nearly enough books doing the same.
This time around, Cash gets drawn into yet another case, and helps solve it in her own, unique, way.
Girl Gone Missing was even sadder than Murder on the Red River, some scenes near the end in particular, which made me want to take a break from listening. Luckily though, everything turned out okay and we got a little preview of what we can expect in the next book.
The mystery was still kind of in the background, and the story mostly focuses on Cash, but I like that, it's a nice change of pace from your average detective novel. We also saw Long Braids again, which is a huge plus for me, I'm hoping he'll become a "true" love interest, so we can see him more often.
Onwards to book three!!
November 25, 2019
What keeps me hooked on this series is the main character, 19-year-old Renee "Cash" Blackbear. In the first book in the series, Murder on the Red River, we learned that Cash spent years in the foster system after a car wreck when she was three. The local Sheriff, Wheaton, has pretty much looked after her all those years and continues now that she's aged out of care and in an apartment on her own in Fargo, North Dakota. At the end of the last book, he strongly urged her to go to college, which she took him up on.
We learn in Girl Gone Missing that she is now a student at Moorhead State across the Red River in Minnesota. She's feeling her way through the experience, still "drives truck" hauling sugar beets, drinks beer and plays pool when she can. One day her brother shows up, having been absent all those years since the accident. He just finished a tour of duty in Vietnam and needs a place to crash. While he's a peripheral character, he has an important place in the book and in Cash's life.
I mentioned in the last book that Cash has "sight" and what she sees and dreams about in this book is a blond girl pleading for help. This kicks off the mystery at the heart of Girl Gone Missing. As in the previous book, I felt that the mystery was just a way for Rendon to develop her characters, their relationships with each other, their struggles and to illustrate the challenges that Native Americans face in this area of the country. Also featured in this story is the budding American Indian Movement, which Cash has a small encounter with when she travels to Minneapolis. I did not know until looking it up that AIM had its start in Minneapolis! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/America...
With all that said, the mystery of what happened to the blond girl felt a little preposterous, but that didn't keep me from turning the pages nor from looking forward to meeting Cash again in Rendon's next book.
Why I'm reading this: I finally cleared the hold list at the library for this second book in a series I like.
We learn in Girl Gone Missing that she is now a student at Moorhead State across the Red River in Minnesota. She's feeling her way through the experience, still "drives truck" hauling sugar beets, drinks beer and plays pool when she can. One day her brother shows up, having been absent all those years since the accident. He just finished a tour of duty in Vietnam and needs a place to crash. While he's a peripheral character, he has an important place in the book and in Cash's life.
I mentioned in the last book that Cash has "sight" and what she sees and dreams about in this book is a blond girl pleading for help. This kicks off the mystery at the heart of Girl Gone Missing. As in the previous book, I felt that the mystery was just a way for Rendon to develop her characters, their relationships with each other, their struggles and to illustrate the challenges that Native Americans face in this area of the country. Also featured in this story is the budding American Indian Movement, which Cash has a small encounter with when she travels to Minneapolis. I did not know until looking it up that AIM had its start in Minneapolis! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/America...
With all that said, the mystery of what happened to the blond girl felt a little preposterous, but that didn't keep me from turning the pages nor from looking forward to meeting Cash again in Rendon's next book.
Why I'm reading this: I finally cleared the hold list at the library for this second book in a series I like.
September 4, 2024
I just finished the second of the Cash Blackbear mysteries and find them intriguing in that the backdrop is the early 70's in small rural farming communities where the Vietnam War, protests, and hippies are front and center. In this world is Renee Blackbear, known to most as Cash. She is Native American and suffered through numerous foster homes where abuse was rampant. Thankfully, she had Wheaton, the sheriff, to become an unofficial guardian for her. We do get to find out Wheaton's backstory and it explains a lot. She does get into college but with her special skill, she is seeing blond/blue eyed girls screaming for help. She does find them, but not without peril for herself. We also get to meet her brother Mo, who had been deployed to Vietnam. He is also a product of foster homes and was dispersed when her mother had an accident when they were all very young. She still has a sister, and her mother is supposedly somewhere. We will see if she gets to meet them in later books.
January 10, 2021
It was so nice to be back alongside Cash again ! I did miss her. My favorite female character. Back in Minnesota in the Valley. She is one of a kind.
Ravie de retrouver Cash dans de nouvelles aventures. Si Fargo vous est familier, alors vous y êtes. La vallée, la récolte de betterave, les années 70, la guerre, les mouvements pacifiques et Cash qui tente de trouver sa place.
Ravie de retrouver Cash dans de nouvelles aventures. Si Fargo vous est familier, alors vous y êtes. La vallée, la récolte de betterave, les années 70, la guerre, les mouvements pacifiques et Cash qui tente de trouver sa place.
May 11, 2023
‘Girl Gone Missing’ by Marcie R. Rendon, book #2 in the Cash Blackbear Mystery series, is a good procedural mystery. The style of writing reminds me of Marcia Muller’s mysteries (Edwin of the Iron Shoes).
The two strongest reasons to read this series are for the setting, Fargo-Moorhead, North Dakota, and for the main character, Cash Blackbear. The action takes place in the 1970’s, even though the author is writing and publishing in 2019.
The series is not standalone, so I strongly advise starting with book 1, Murder on the Red River. Readers will get a more complete backstory about Cash in the first book in the series.
Nineteen-year-old Cash (Renee) is a damaged person, having been tossed from foster home to foster home, suffering unspeakable things, especially for a child. As a result, Cash may not be the most likeable sleuth. She drinks too much, and she has meaningless one-night stands. One man, Sheriff Wheaton, is the only person who cares for her. He rescued her from her drunk mother’s crashed car when she was three years old. He tried to check in with her as often as he could, to protect her, but there was only so much he could do, especially since he is not related to her.
An Ojibwa, she is distrustful of everyone, including other Native-Americans. But she trusts Sheriff Wheaton enough to seek him out when she is feeling in need of a friend. Wheaton has helped her get into college, Moorhead State in Minnesota. For money, Cash drives big trucks and farming machines, such as tractors, and doing odd jobs for local farmers as a laborer, which she has been doing since she was eleven years old. She lives in a small apartment above a bar.
I have copied the book blurb:
”Nothing in Renee Blackbear’s world had prepared her for college or for the hurt that happens in the Twin Cities.
Her name is Renee Blackbear, but what most people call the 19-year-old Chippewa woman is Cash. She lived all her life in Fargo, sister city to Minnesota’s Moorhead, just downriver from the Cities. She has one friend, the sheriff Wheaton. He pulled her from her mother’s wrecked car when she was three. Since then, Cash navigated through foster homes, and at 13 was working full-time on farms, driving truck.
Wheaton wants her to take hold of her life, signs her up for college. She gets an education there at Moorhead State all right: sees that people talk a lot but mostly about nothing, not like the men in the fields she’s known all her life who hold the rich topsoil in their hands, talk fertilizer and weather and prices on the Grain Exchange.
In between classes and hauling beets, drinking beer and shooting pool, a man who claims he’s her brother shows up, and she begins to dream the Cities and blonde Scandinavian girls calling for help.”
These novels are more like a character study than mysteries. It is only the terse ‘just the facts’ style and that eventually Cash solves a mystery in the last third of the book that the plot does become a mystery. Cash doesn’t ever really plan on solving mysteries. She seems to come across them serendipitously. Once she is in the middle of whatever unexpected nefarious doings she accidentally becomes involved in, she demonstrates a very tough no-nonsense intelligence. Her upbringing has given her skills! However, she is all about surviving, not about being a good guy. But she can’t walk away from saving helpless folks.
The two strongest reasons to read this series are for the setting, Fargo-Moorhead, North Dakota, and for the main character, Cash Blackbear. The action takes place in the 1970’s, even though the author is writing and publishing in 2019.
The series is not standalone, so I strongly advise starting with book 1, Murder on the Red River. Readers will get a more complete backstory about Cash in the first book in the series.
Nineteen-year-old Cash (Renee) is a damaged person, having been tossed from foster home to foster home, suffering unspeakable things, especially for a child. As a result, Cash may not be the most likeable sleuth. She drinks too much, and she has meaningless one-night stands. One man, Sheriff Wheaton, is the only person who cares for her. He rescued her from her drunk mother’s crashed car when she was three years old. He tried to check in with her as often as he could, to protect her, but there was only so much he could do, especially since he is not related to her.
An Ojibwa, she is distrustful of everyone, including other Native-Americans. But she trusts Sheriff Wheaton enough to seek him out when she is feeling in need of a friend. Wheaton has helped her get into college, Moorhead State in Minnesota. For money, Cash drives big trucks and farming machines, such as tractors, and doing odd jobs for local farmers as a laborer, which she has been doing since she was eleven years old. She lives in a small apartment above a bar.
I have copied the book blurb:
”Nothing in Renee Blackbear’s world had prepared her for college or for the hurt that happens in the Twin Cities.
Her name is Renee Blackbear, but what most people call the 19-year-old Chippewa woman is Cash. She lived all her life in Fargo, sister city to Minnesota’s Moorhead, just downriver from the Cities. She has one friend, the sheriff Wheaton. He pulled her from her mother’s wrecked car when she was three. Since then, Cash navigated through foster homes, and at 13 was working full-time on farms, driving truck.
Wheaton wants her to take hold of her life, signs her up for college. She gets an education there at Moorhead State all right: sees that people talk a lot but mostly about nothing, not like the men in the fields she’s known all her life who hold the rich topsoil in their hands, talk fertilizer and weather and prices on the Grain Exchange.
In between classes and hauling beets, drinking beer and shooting pool, a man who claims he’s her brother shows up, and she begins to dream the Cities and blonde Scandinavian girls calling for help.”
These novels are more like a character study than mysteries. It is only the terse ‘just the facts’ style and that eventually Cash solves a mystery in the last third of the book that the plot does become a mystery. Cash doesn’t ever really plan on solving mysteries. She seems to come across them serendipitously. Once she is in the middle of whatever unexpected nefarious doings she accidentally becomes involved in, she demonstrates a very tough no-nonsense intelligence. Her upbringing has given her skills! However, she is all about surviving, not about being a good guy. But she can’t walk away from saving helpless folks.
July 25, 2019
Having lived in the Red River Valley for six years, every detail of this book felt as if I had travelled back, as if I was riding along with Cash in her Ranchero to the small towns in the valley. There are several twists and turns that make you think, and the side characters were very well written. Without giving too much away, I also appreciated the raw and real story of Cash's upbringing, and the awareness that this story brought for MMIW.
December 5, 2022
Unfortunately this was a disappointment for me.
Now granted, I don't often read from the mystery genre but I do enjoy it - I'm just impatient to get to the mystery resolution.
However - this was barely a mystery. We find out the first girl goes missing in the first 25-30 pages, and the second girl in 50-60 pages in. And then NOTHING HAPPENS for 150 more pages - until the final third. And even then, it's quick, predictable, and not all that gritty despite what other reviews say.
I thought - erroneously - Cash was an amateur detective type character based on the back of the book. No, she's just a traumatized young adult going to college and working, barely dealing with her past and just stumbles into whatever the (barely there) plot is. She's also really predictable as a character - nothing about her was unique or interesting. I was bored by her.
If - like me - you haven't read the first book because you got it in the Raven Reads box (which is an amazing subscription box service fyi), you definitely don't need to have read that one. It's summarized throughout this second book (as many serialized mysteries are) and I highly doubt there was any character development between the first and second novels as there was none in this one.
I appreciated the author's note as she explains the importance and tragedy of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (and Two-Spirit) movement that the Canadian and American governments ignore and in many ways perpetrate. However, that note couldn't save this book.
It was a quick read and not the series for me.
CW: attempted sexual assault, drugging, off-page branding, human trafficking, PTSD from Vietnam war, previous abuse from foster homes, racist language
Now granted, I don't often read from the mystery genre but I do enjoy it - I'm just impatient to get to the mystery resolution.
However - this was barely a mystery. We find out the first girl goes missing in the first 25-30 pages, and the second girl in 50-60 pages in. And then NOTHING HAPPENS for 150 more pages - until the final third. And even then, it's quick, predictable, and not all that gritty despite what other reviews say.
I thought - erroneously - Cash was an amateur detective type character based on the back of the book. No, she's just a traumatized young adult going to college and working, barely dealing with her past and just stumbles into whatever the (barely there) plot is. She's also really predictable as a character - nothing about her was unique or interesting. I was bored by her.
If - like me - you haven't read the first book because you got it in the Raven Reads box (which is an amazing subscription box service fyi), you definitely don't need to have read that one. It's summarized throughout this second book (as many serialized mysteries are) and I highly doubt there was any character development between the first and second novels as there was none in this one.
I appreciated the author's note as she explains the importance and tragedy of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (and Two-Spirit) movement that the Canadian and American governments ignore and in many ways perpetrate. However, that note couldn't save this book.
It was a quick read and not the series for me.
CW: attempted sexual assault, drugging, off-page branding, human trafficking, PTSD from Vietnam war, previous abuse from foster homes, racist language
July 31, 2019
I thought this was an exciting read. I hadn’t read the first book featuring Cash, and I’d recommend that you do that, and I will now go do that! The main character, Cash, seemed very realistic and the Fargo Moorhead and Ada scenes were exactly right.
I thought the ending seemed rushed compared to the first two-thirds of the book, and the resolution was way too easy and pat, but still, it was exciting and I liked the book.
I thought the ending seemed rushed compared to the first two-thirds of the book, and the resolution was way too easy and pat, but still, it was exciting and I liked the book.
July 10, 2019
I really love the setting and the main character, which are both wonderfully rendered. The crime plot, however, feels tacked on, is rather nonsensical, and is too easily resolved.
May 12, 2019
Warnings: child abuse, implied child sexual abuse, kidnapping, sex slavery, sexual assault (attempted rape, implied rape), racial slurs, alcohol and tobacco abuse, physical violence (assault, branding), PTSD, mentions of war, mentions of slut-shaming, discussion of stolen generation of Native Americans
Rep: The protagonist is a Native American woman (OwnVoices)
Set roughly in the 60s, this novel about a young Native American girl in college who gets caught up in a missing persons case. I was through about a third of the book when I realized (from external sources) that this book isn't the first in the series. However, it fills in the blanks enough and gives plenty backstory that it doesn't feel like you are missing out on any story. Now, it is not exactly a mystery but instead has more of noir vibe, if you know what I am saying? For a lot of the book, it is just setting up the atmosphere and dips lightly into the mystery of the missing girls, and the actual 'mystery' comes in the last quarter.
Renee 'Cash' Blackbear is a freshman in college, and she makes a living working a beet truck and at the pool tables. She is clever and tests out the beginner classes she is taking; she also faces microaggressions with the college staff constantly underestimating her. When she hears about her missing classmate, she contacts and informs her previous guardian and only parental figure, the sheriff of her town. While he is looking into the matter, she is searching for answers in her dreams where she can astrally project her consciousness over her neighboring towns. The sudden arrival of her long-lost brother (who is a veteran of the Vietnam war) in her life also changes her a bit, making her think back on the families she was passed around in, the abuse she suffered, and the simple fact that she doesn't know what to do when she is being cared for, for a change. In between the lines and overtly, there is also discussion of how Native American children done wrong by the government, the situation with the movement asking for civil rights, sex slavery, the Vietnam war, and just the life in farming communities.
Most of the book is about her daily routine; now this actually sets the mood and atmosphere for the book, and describes her characterization without actually putting words to it. But then again, sometimes the book overdoes that and we get unnecessary details of her day-to-day tasks, like her waking up, getting ready, going to college, going straight to the farms after college or the bar to play pool or the rec center to play pool; these take up a bulk of the book, and since it all just repeats and repeats they all feel insignificant by the end. Three-fourths of this book is just describing her actions, and they get boring after the first couple of times, because nothing is actually happening with the plot while words are getting wasted on a mystery that doesn't even bother to leave out clues. When she finally gets to the cities, and the time comes for her to save those girls, that is only when the plot feels like it has picked up to go somewhere.
So, while this is a nice character-centric book, as a mystery or crime novel, it leaves much to be desired.
Received an advance reader copy in exchange for a fair review from Cinco Puntos Press, via Edelweiss.
Rep: The protagonist is a Native American woman (OwnVoices)
Set roughly in the 60s, this novel about a young Native American girl in college who gets caught up in a missing persons case. I was through about a third of the book when I realized (from external sources) that this book isn't the first in the series. However, it fills in the blanks enough and gives plenty backstory that it doesn't feel like you are missing out on any story. Now, it is not exactly a mystery but instead has more of noir vibe, if you know what I am saying? For a lot of the book, it is just setting up the atmosphere and dips lightly into the mystery of the missing girls, and the actual 'mystery' comes in the last quarter.
Renee 'Cash' Blackbear is a freshman in college, and she makes a living working a beet truck and at the pool tables. She is clever and tests out the beginner classes she is taking; she also faces microaggressions with the college staff constantly underestimating her. When she hears about her missing classmate, she contacts and informs her previous guardian and only parental figure, the sheriff of her town. While he is looking into the matter, she is searching for answers in her dreams where she can astrally project her consciousness over her neighboring towns. The sudden arrival of her long-lost brother (who is a veteran of the Vietnam war) in her life also changes her a bit, making her think back on the families she was passed around in, the abuse she suffered, and the simple fact that she doesn't know what to do when she is being cared for, for a change. In between the lines and overtly, there is also discussion of how Native American children done wrong by the government, the situation with the movement asking for civil rights, sex slavery, the Vietnam war, and just the life in farming communities.
Most of the book is about her daily routine; now this actually sets the mood and atmosphere for the book, and describes her characterization without actually putting words to it. But then again, sometimes the book overdoes that and we get unnecessary details of her day-to-day tasks, like her waking up, getting ready, going to college, going straight to the farms after college or the bar to play pool or the rec center to play pool; these take up a bulk of the book, and since it all just repeats and repeats they all feel insignificant by the end. Three-fourths of this book is just describing her actions, and they get boring after the first couple of times, because nothing is actually happening with the plot while words are getting wasted on a mystery that doesn't even bother to leave out clues. When she finally gets to the cities, and the time comes for her to save those girls, that is only when the plot feels like it has picked up to go somewhere.
So, while this is a nice character-centric book, as a mystery or crime novel, it leaves much to be desired.
Received an advance reader copy in exchange for a fair review from Cinco Puntos Press, via Edelweiss.
June 29, 2019
Excellent Crime Novel (TW addiction/ past child abuse/ human trafficking/ rape/ brief past attempted suicide mention with detail)
Easily one of my favorite reads this year, I loved Cash so much! This is a character-driven crime novel with suspense that follows 19-year-old Chippewa woman Renee Blackbear, known as Cash, living in Fargo in the 1970s. She lives on the periphery of everything: she’s taking college classes but doesn’t understand the hippie students and their need to constantly talk, drives a beet truck alone late at night for work, lives on her own, and her only close relationship is with a sheriff who is like a father figure. She’s always observing, thinking, and questioning the things that are happening in her world and the larger world, especially when the brother she doesn’t know shows up to stay in her place and white girls are disappearing while calling to her in dreams. While it isn’t a mystery as you’re used to–person(s) actively solving–there is a mystery throughout that is important and has a full solve. I so very much need there to be another book about Cash, and while I definitely talk way too much for her I want to go play pool with her! (You can totally read this crime novel as a standalone, and seriously read this one!)
--from Book Riot's Unusual Suspects newsletter: https://link.bookriot.com/view/56a820...
Easily one of my favorite reads this year, I loved Cash so much! This is a character-driven crime novel with suspense that follows 19-year-old Chippewa woman Renee Blackbear, known as Cash, living in Fargo in the 1970s. She lives on the periphery of everything: she’s taking college classes but doesn’t understand the hippie students and their need to constantly talk, drives a beet truck alone late at night for work, lives on her own, and her only close relationship is with a sheriff who is like a father figure. She’s always observing, thinking, and questioning the things that are happening in her world and the larger world, especially when the brother she doesn’t know shows up to stay in her place and white girls are disappearing while calling to her in dreams. While it isn’t a mystery as you’re used to–person(s) actively solving–there is a mystery throughout that is important and has a full solve. I so very much need there to be another book about Cash, and while I definitely talk way too much for her I want to go play pool with her! (You can totally read this crime novel as a standalone, and seriously read this one!)
--from Book Riot's Unusual Suspects newsletter: https://link.bookriot.com/view/56a820...
January 22, 2023
A great book. Slow in the beginning but very suspenseful at the end. The author's notes at the end shed some light on both MMIW (Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women) and the disinheriting of adopted Native American children.
I know this is a book site, but I watched a very good movie dealing with the subject of MMIW called Catch the Fair One. Highly recommended but dark subject matter, so maybe not recommended for everyone.
I know this is a book site, but I watched a very good movie dealing with the subject of MMIW called Catch the Fair One. Highly recommended but dark subject matter, so maybe not recommended for everyone.
February 16, 2023
I felt this one was not nearly on par with the first in the series. I look forward to the next book, hoping it will more satisfying, I enjoy the character of Cash Blackbear.
December 2, 2020
I really liked this book and would love to read more about protagonist Cash Blackbear. Author Marcie R. Rendon, a citizen of the White Earth Nation, won the McKnight Foundation’s 2020 Distinguished Artist Award as "the author of poems, plays, children’s books, and novels that explore the resilience and brilliance of Native peoples."
Cash Blackbear is a damaged young woman who, taken against her will from her own family in northern Minnesota, suffered cruelty in a series of foster families. But despite occasional glass-smashing, destructive outbursts, she has become a person who gives the world more than it gave her. Her one-day-at-a-time life involves beer, cigarettes, shooting pool, driving a beet truck for farmers at night, and now college. She's attending college because her mentor, Sheriff Wheaton, wants her to have a better future. She doesn't allow herself hope, though. Hoping has never paid off.
In this episode, Cash works to solve the case of studious, well-rounded, beautiful, and loved white girls who have disappeared from parts of North Dakota, where Cash lives, and Minnesota, where she attends college. The 1960s characters are fine in the beginning, but the story really took off when a stranger knocks at Cash's door at 6 a.m. and says he's her brother. She has only the vaguest memories of any real family. Mo (his Vietnam buddies called him Geronimo or Mo) is a fully fleshed-out character, with a range of surprising skills like cooking marvelous breakfasts. He also has PTSD, which strikes unexpectedly with some dramatic hallucinating.
All fascinating. But the main thing I want to tell you is what I learned about the foster-care system for indigenous children. Perhaps there are cases that are not total horror stories, but Rendon doesn't tell us about those. She should know. She experienced foster care. In her afterward, she informs the reader that the injustice two characters in particular suffered is actually common. They were used for heavy farmwork and taking care of younger, biological children in families, and promised they would inherit the farm. In one case, the foster child was even adopted. But when push came to shove, these two were let loose with nothing.
That scenario sounded real to me. And it's something I knew nothing about, having assumed in my ignorance that forcible removal to orphanages was followed by something better. If one thinks of this cruelty from an indigenous perspective -- namely that the farmland was stolen from tribes in the first place -- I imagine that the pain can be intolerable. Rendon has turned her pain to educating us through her art, the best way for people to learn.
Interestingly, Rendon uses the term "Indian" a lot, which made me wonder if I'm overly PC with terms like "Native American" and "indigenous." I have read that people like to be referred to by tribe. I have also heard they may refer to themselves as "Indian people." Got to read more mysteries to figure this out.
Cash Blackbear is a damaged young woman who, taken against her will from her own family in northern Minnesota, suffered cruelty in a series of foster families. But despite occasional glass-smashing, destructive outbursts, she has become a person who gives the world more than it gave her. Her one-day-at-a-time life involves beer, cigarettes, shooting pool, driving a beet truck for farmers at night, and now college. She's attending college because her mentor, Sheriff Wheaton, wants her to have a better future. She doesn't allow herself hope, though. Hoping has never paid off.
In this episode, Cash works to solve the case of studious, well-rounded, beautiful, and loved white girls who have disappeared from parts of North Dakota, where Cash lives, and Minnesota, where she attends college. The 1960s characters are fine in the beginning, but the story really took off when a stranger knocks at Cash's door at 6 a.m. and says he's her brother. She has only the vaguest memories of any real family. Mo (his Vietnam buddies called him Geronimo or Mo) is a fully fleshed-out character, with a range of surprising skills like cooking marvelous breakfasts. He also has PTSD, which strikes unexpectedly with some dramatic hallucinating.
All fascinating. But the main thing I want to tell you is what I learned about the foster-care system for indigenous children. Perhaps there are cases that are not total horror stories, but Rendon doesn't tell us about those. She should know. She experienced foster care. In her afterward, she informs the reader that the injustice two characters in particular suffered is actually common. They were used for heavy farmwork and taking care of younger, biological children in families, and promised they would inherit the farm. In one case, the foster child was even adopted. But when push came to shove, these two were let loose with nothing.
That scenario sounded real to me. And it's something I knew nothing about, having assumed in my ignorance that forcible removal to orphanages was followed by something better. If one thinks of this cruelty from an indigenous perspective -- namely that the farmland was stolen from tribes in the first place -- I imagine that the pain can be intolerable. Rendon has turned her pain to educating us through her art, the best way for people to learn.
Interestingly, Rendon uses the term "Indian" a lot, which made me wonder if I'm overly PC with terms like "Native American" and "indigenous." I have read that people like to be referred to by tribe. I have also heard they may refer to themselves as "Indian people." Got to read more mysteries to figure this out.
June 12, 2022
3.5 rounded up! The actual mystery plot/pacing was so-so, but the characters are fantastic, especially Cash, who is complex, smart, and charismatic. I've never met a heroine quite like her. She spends a good portion of the book shooting pool, drinking, and smoking, and yet has a strong work ethic, a brilliant mind, and a caring heart under a gruff exterior. Loved her!!
I loved how even though this book skirted around some very serious issues affecting Indigenous peoples, it still showed the consequences of them through the characters, consequences they were trying their best to tough through and carry on. The book spends a lot of time on the minutae of Cash's routines, and it really gives a sense of how she keeps carrying forward one step at a time. Something about the understatement of it all made it powerful.
The writing style is clean and factual, with the author trusting the reader to read between the lines.
Overall, will definitely check out more in this series!
I loved how even though this book skirted around some very serious issues affecting Indigenous peoples, it still showed the consequences of them through the characters, consequences they were trying their best to tough through and carry on. The book spends a lot of time on the minutae of Cash's routines, and it really gives a sense of how she keeps carrying forward one step at a time. Something about the understatement of it all made it powerful.
The writing style is clean and factual, with the author trusting the reader to read between the lines.
Overall, will definitely check out more in this series!
July 7, 2019
Good story, could have used an editor. Way too many words.
April 7, 2024
This is book two of the three book series with Renee (Cash) Blackbear as the main character.
Cash is now a college student by day and drives big farm wheat and beet trucks by night. During her time off she drinks beer and shoots pool. Her friend Sheriff Wheaton enrolled her in school because he believes she can make a better life for herself.
She continues to be haunted by the abuse she endured in the numerous foster homes she was forced into until Wheaton rescued her setting her up in her own apartment. She also has a sort of friend in school, a white girl named Sharon although Redon doesn't really develop the character much other than she has taken a liking to Cash and she has a Native American boyfriend.
In this chapter of Cash's life out of the blue her brother comes into the picture and crashes in her apartment. He served in Vietnam and is trying to decide if he should re-up. He tells her that their sister is still alive but does not know where their mother ended up.
Cash decides to test out of a couple of her classes. Her English professor submitted one of her essays into a competition which she wins. He convinces her to go to the cities (Minneapolis, St. Paul) for the awards ceremony. As cautious as she is, Cash finds herself entangle in a case of some missing white girls.
This story, although good, took a while to move along. The books are pretty short so reading the next should feel like a continuation of the same book.
Cash is now a college student by day and drives big farm wheat and beet trucks by night. During her time off she drinks beer and shoots pool. Her friend Sheriff Wheaton enrolled her in school because he believes she can make a better life for herself.
She continues to be haunted by the abuse she endured in the numerous foster homes she was forced into until Wheaton rescued her setting her up in her own apartment. She also has a sort of friend in school, a white girl named Sharon although Redon doesn't really develop the character much other than she has taken a liking to Cash and she has a Native American boyfriend.
In this chapter of Cash's life out of the blue her brother comes into the picture and crashes in her apartment. He served in Vietnam and is trying to decide if he should re-up. He tells her that their sister is still alive but does not know where their mother ended up.
Cash decides to test out of a couple of her classes. Her English professor submitted one of her essays into a competition which she wins. He convinces her to go to the cities (Minneapolis, St. Paul) for the awards ceremony. As cautious as she is, Cash finds herself entangle in a case of some missing white girls.
This story, although good, took a while to move along. The books are pretty short so reading the next should feel like a continuation of the same book.
June 21, 2023
In the second installment of the Cash Blackbear mystery series, a girl goes missing from Cash's college class, a good girl that nobody thinks has run away. Sheriff Wheaton is on the case, but Cash also asks around, seeing what she can find out. Keeping an ear on the community buzz, Cash finds out another blond farm girl from a nearby community has gone missing. Meanwhile, Cash is excelling at school, testing out of classes and being nominated for a writing prize. When Cash goes to the big city to the writing prize ceremony, her path intersects with the case of the missing girls...
I really like this series because it's more a series of coming-of-age tales about Cash that happen to have a little mystery in them, rather than a mystery-forward novel with lots of twists and red herrings. The best part of the novels is seeing Cash growing into her better/best self. I really enjoy these.
I really like this series because it's more a series of coming-of-age tales about Cash that happen to have a little mystery in them, rather than a mystery-forward novel with lots of twists and red herrings. The best part of the novels is seeing Cash growing into her better/best self. I really enjoy these.
September 21, 2025
In my opinion, this book was better than the first.
It had a good change of scenery and introduced more characters compared to the first, characters you could get to know more about, too.
Cash had a lot of growth in this book - showing more emotion and putting herself in more uncomfortable scenarios for her future benefit.
I do have to admit, once again, the book feels rushed and a little bit unrealistic. A 19 year old frail girl saves 5 other girls from human trafficking? All within like 2 hours? But overall, the plot was good.
The ending is OBVIOUSLY set up for a 3rd book. I saw there are 2 more in this series but I lack the interest of continuing forward with this specific series. I also don't think my library carries the last 2.
It had a good change of scenery and introduced more characters compared to the first, characters you could get to know more about, too.
Cash had a lot of growth in this book - showing more emotion and putting herself in more uncomfortable scenarios for her future benefit.
I do have to admit, once again, the book feels rushed and a little bit unrealistic. A 19 year old frail girl saves 5 other girls from human trafficking? All within like 2 hours? But overall, the plot was good.
The ending is OBVIOUSLY set up for a 3rd book. I saw there are 2 more in this series but I lack the interest of continuing forward with this specific series. I also don't think my library carries the last 2.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
January 5, 2023
I enjoyed this second book in the series more than the first one. Cash’s world has expanded and she is meeting more hopes of people, especially as related to the college. Her mysterious brother has shown up and helps to save the day. There was a happy ending. But one thing that bothered me how the brother showed up at the particular house at the exact minute he was needed. The author didn’t sufficiently explain this. Still, I’m looking forward to reading the next book in the series about this Indigenous amateur detective.
November 12, 2022
Cash/Renee Blackbear's life was breaking my heart 💧💔 Marcie R. Rendon is a brilliant author. This was such another perfect read to celebrate Native American Heritage Month. The word that inevitably jumped at me all through the story was
sorrow
💧Why inevitable? The time frame of the series was in the 70s ~ the Vietnam War Era💔💥 The period of sorrow ~ of mistakes & errors ~ in Domestic as well as Foreign Policies. How many times could we keep repeating such History? Forever and ever, so it seemed!
I was glad Cash was in college, that she was so smart and way ahead in all the prerequisite 101s classes! That she could finally become Someone! She wouldn't remain just a lost orphan deserving nothing better than driving a beet truck or earning her rent by playing a random pool tournament.
Unfortunately ~ her freshman year sent her straight into a clutch of a monster! Only by her street smart ~ her determination not to die that day ~ an assistance from her long lost brother ~ plus the stupidity of the villains ~ had saved her and the other girls ~ from the human trafficking ring!
So yeah ~ SORROW 💧The best quote 💧💔🩸
I was glad Cash was in college, that she was so smart and way ahead in all the prerequisite 101s classes! That she could finally become Someone! She wouldn't remain just a lost orphan deserving nothing better than driving a beet truck or earning her rent by playing a random pool tournament.
Unfortunately ~ her freshman year sent her straight into a clutch of a monster! Only by her street smart ~ her determination not to die that day ~ an assistance from her long lost brother ~ plus the stupidity of the villains ~ had saved her and the other girls ~ from the human trafficking ring!
So yeah ~ SORROW 💧The best quote 💧💔🩸
"Ours is not to reason why,
ours is but to do or die."
April 4, 2024
This rarely happens, but I liked this second book in the series better than I did the first. The main character Cash is more fleshed out here than in Murder on The Red, and the story line is faster paced. I look forward to the third book and the continued growth of this author.
July 15, 2024
Solid. Not sure why I enjoy these books about Cash, a Native American, college student in Fargo who struggles to go to school and work and helps a mentor/local sheriff with odd cases. I’m impressed with how she endures.
December 8, 2022
The characters and writing are good, like the first in the series. But I the plot was weak. I still will read the next one though.
June 18, 2023
Another enjoyable read about Cash Blackbear. I like her as a character, flaws and all. Sometimes reading about her driving and the Ranchero can get old.
November 20, 2025
the mystery was more a side plot of this book and a bit of a trigger warning for SA but enjoyed reading more about cash
November 2, 2022
Gobbled this up in 3 days so I can get right to her 3rd Cash Blackbear book, Sinister Graves. I love Cash as a character, and the plot is consistent and full of true history. Evocative language. A good mystery, also fun for novel readers.
March 11, 2022
Ojibwa heroine Cash Blackbear is irrepressible & inspiring in this 2nd book in the mystery series. A vivid & gritty sense of 1970s Minnesota and bordering North Dakota; the 1st book is Murder on the Red River. Watch for the 3rd book Sinister Graves which will be published in October! Kudos to Rendon, an enrolled member of the White Earth Anishinabe Nation (Ojibwa Indians) in northwestern Minnesota!
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