The Master Butchers Singing Club

by Louise Erdrich

From National Book Award-winning, New York Times -bestselling author Louise Erdrich, a profound and enchanting new novel: a richly imagined world “where butchers sing like angels.” Having survived World War I, Fidelis Waldvogel returns to his quiet German village and marries the pregnant widow of his best friend, killed in action. With a suitcase full of sausages and a master butcher's precious knife set, Fidelis sets out for America. In Argus, North Dakota, he builds a business, a home for his family—which includes Eva and four sons—and a singing club consisting of the best voices in town. When the Old World meets the New—in the person of Delphine Watzka—the great adventure of Fidelis's life begins. Delphine meets Eva and is enchanted. She meets Fidelis, and the ground trembles. These momentous encounters will determine the course of Delphine's life, and the trajectory of this brilliant novel.

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Book Club, Literary Fiction, Historical, Audiobook, Native American

388 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2003

About the author

Karen Louise Erdrich is a American author of novels, poetry, and children's books. Her father is German American and mother is half Ojibwe and half French American. She is an enrolled member of the Anishinaabe nation (also known as Chippewa). She is widely acclaimed as one of the most significant Native writers of the second wave of what critic Kenneth Lincoln has called the Native American Renaissance.

For more information, please see http://www.answers.com/topic/louise-e...

From a book description:

Author Biography:

Louise Erdrich is one of the most gifted, prolific, and challenging of contemporary Native American novelists. Born in 1954 in Little Falls, Minnesota, she grew up mostly in Wahpeton, North Dakota, where her parents taught at Bureau of Indian Affairs schools. Her fiction reflects aspects of her mixed heritage: German through her father, and French and Ojibwa through her mother. She worked at various jobs, such as hoeing sugar beets, farm work, waitressing, short order cooking, lifeguarding, and construction work, before becoming a writer. She attended the Johns Hopkins creative writing program and received fellowships at the McDowell Colony and the Yaddo Colony. After she was named writer-in-residence at Dartmouth, she married professor Michael Dorris and raised several children, some of them adopted. She and Michael became a picture-book husband-and-wife writing team, though they wrote only one truly collaborative novel, The Crown of Columbus (1991).

The Antelope Wife was published in 1998, not long after her separation from Michael and his subsequent suicide. Some reviewers believed they saw in The Antelope Wife the anguish Erdrich must have felt as her marriage crumbled, but she has stated that she is unconscious of having mirrored any real-life events.

She is the author of four previous bestselling andaward-winning novels, including Love Medicine; The Beet Queen; Tracks; and The Bingo Palace. She also has written two collections of poetry, Jacklight, and Baptism of Desire. Her fiction has been honored by the National Book Critics Circle (1984) and The Los Angeles Times (1985), and has been translated into fourteen languages.

Several of her short stories have been selected for O. Henry awards and for inclusion in the annual Best American Short Story anthologies. The Blue Jay's Dance, a memoir of motherhood, was her first nonfiction work, and her children's book, Grandmother's Pigeon, has been published by Hyperion Press. She lives in Minnesota with her children, who help her run a small independent bookstore called The Birchbark.

Reviews

[Debbie W. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Why I chose to listen to this audiobook:
1. since I have never read anything by Louise Erdrich before, several GR friends recommended various books of hers;
2. this audiobook was available on Hoopla; and,
3. August 2022 is my "As the Spirit Moves Me Month".

Praises:
1. although this story travels in time from 1917 to 1954, it is not the typical historical fiction being published today. It's a story of humanity - of life and death, love and loss, loyalty and betrayal, secrets and lies, struggles and triumphs;
2. strong characterization is the star of this novel! Our fierce leading ladies were a force to be reckoned with: feisty Delphine Watzka; loyal Eva Waldvogel; astute Step-And-A-Half. Their equally interesting male counterparts held their own as well: confused Cyprian Lazarre; hardworking Fidelis Waldvogel; town drunk Roy Watzka; Even the secondary characters are in a league of their own! I was transfixed by them all as I followed them throughout the years. Many of them surprised me;
3. Erdrich is a master of description! The reader cannot help but feel immersed in her stirring prose, right down to the details of the various types of soaps and brushes in Fidelis and Eva's bathroom!
4. this audiobook was narrated by Erdrich herself! Her pleasant cadence was perfect for this story; and,
5. Erdrich is known for portraying her Native American roots. I can understand why many readers may think that she veered away from it in this story, but don't let that fool you. Even the title, which many seem inconsequential to the story, packs a punch right up to the end with its powerful symbolism.

Niggle:
As I've mentioned, the vivid descriptiveness placed the reader into the lives of these characters; however, sometimes it felt a wee bit overwhelming.

Overall Thoughts:
I really enjoyed following the lives of these unforgettable characters and their interesting (and occasionally, heartbreaking) lives. I will definitely read more by this author!

Recommendation?
If you prefer fast-paced, instant gratification from a book that's 200 pages or less, then don't read this book. But if you enjoy savoring strong characterization amid extremely descriptive yet jaw-dropping prose, then Louise Erdrich is the author for you!

[Barb H · Rating 5 out of 5]

How does one review a book written by a true artistic voice and do justice to its telling? One should not expect a synopsis here, that can easily be found elsewhere. This is a beautiful, often painful novel.

Although Louise Erdrich generally places emphasis on the Native American in her books, she has chosen to take a different route with this novel. The occasional references to American Indians are by no means insignificant, however, but add spice to an already intriguing narrative. Her many, varied characters have come alive on the pages to give the reader a sense of recognition throughout. It is not difficult to develop feelings for these individuals, each with his or her intriguing situation. Erdrich has explored the depths and peaks of the emotions of her characters with stark, lyrical realism. Her narrative of the environment which existed for them was beautifully and palpably etched throughout.

It is rare that I give a book a five star rating, but this seems to easily merit this place. Although I feel that much more can and should be said about this writer and her offering, I will continue to contemplate the messages that she has set down in her skillful writing.

[Anika · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book was incredibly frustrating. Erdrich has plenty of skill setting up the beginning of a story - she does it about twelve times - but never manages to actually stay with any particular arc. Stories and characters are established just enough to whet your interest, and then she just wanders to another one. Think you'll be staying with Fidelis, the titular master butcher, after he travels from Germany to North Dakota? Meh, he'll sort of be around, but you'll never get a better sense of how he ticks. Want to know what the clear and immediate attraction between him and Delphine will lead to? That story will totally peter out and happen pretty much offstage. Interested in the murder mystery that gets set up, or the story of Delphine's friend? None of these things will ever really be focused on. You end up with a serious case of literary blue balls, wishing that the author had been as interested in her own characters as you are.

[Elaine · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a lumpy weird passionate sweep of a novel. There was lots that irked me - pacing that speeded up and then slowed way way down and the central passion seems hollow (and mostly happens offstage) - but I read compulsively nonetheless.

Indeed, the book's real passions are the all the non-couple pairings- women friends, parents and children, adoptive parents, platonic male and female pairs - and these relationships are intense and compelling and give the book a wonderfully rich texture. It's just that we are supposed to believe that the earth moved when our hero and heroine so much as glanced at each other. And that rang false.

But it ultimately doesn't matter because there's so much strange meaty life here. The book is full of imagery about things that worm their way up out of cellars and soil, that won't stay buried, and the narrative is similarly constructed - a North Dakota town in the middle of nowhere ends up being the knot where many threads of history and mystery come together. The Native American genocide, World War I, the Holocaust - it's all there, or you can just read this book as a quirky gothic family tale. Unlike the recent Erdrich (The Round House) I read, this book is not didactic. The Master Butchers Singing Club's slaughters - of Native Americans, livestock, wild dogs - are gutpunchingly stark and brutal (an awful lot of dead things in this book), but the tone is never hectoring.

Ultimately, the book sprawls over its margins a bit. A lot is started, and like life, only some of it is finished. But the gritty, bloody, earthy vibrancy is very compelling and I forgave the book its lumpiness.

I will say that this book is not for the squeamish. There were several extended sequences where I felt literally nauseous reading - I quickly learned this was not a breakfast table book.

[Margitte · Rating 4 out of 5]

Louise Erdrich's literary novels are filled with rainbows of different time periods in history, and include expanded lists of characters which could focus on different events and personalities and paints a colorful portrait of life, even if the hues are dark and uncompromising. I guess her books are like certain gourmet foods. An acquired taste.

If I can compare it with other books similar in ambiance, authors such as Amy Tan, Lisa See, Wiley Cash, Erskine Caldwell, Cormack McCarthy and Jonis Agee comes to mind.

I enjoyed this novel set in North Dakota beginning after WWI and ending after WWII. German immigrants settled down in a small town where Fidelis Waldvogel and his wife Eva opened up a butchery and try to fit into a new society.

Their paths crossed with local characters with which they form strong bonds, when Fidelis started the master butcher's singing club.

It became the story of women enduring tough challenges while being involved in different forms of relationships with men and among themselves.

It's not a book for the fainthearted since many brutalities adorn the plot and were often revolting. However, the prose is beautiful in all its blasé-glory. There's no other way of describing the captivating experience, although it took some guts at times to continue reading.

The Round House was my first encounter with this author's work. The writing style is unique, authentic, grounded, honest and real.

Well, this is North Dakota-noir, intense, Gothic and dark at times, but an unforgettable good reading experience. Masterfully written. In an inexplicable way I felt immensely enriched.

[Hannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the fourth book by Louise Erdrich that I've read. I loved the Beet Queen, and I wanted to read more of Erdrich's works. I realize I like her books more when more action is happening. This one was odd in that it was both very slow and moved fairly fast. I guess it spans 1918 to 1954, so there's a lot to cover. The pace of the book was fast in this sense. Where it was slow was in the relationships developed and the questions answered, though at the end, I have even more questions.

Book is largely sad for me. Immigrant life is already hard, but did it also need to be this tragic? I'd wonder the same about being Indigenous. I feel like I need to join a book club just so I can unpack this book with other people. There's so much I'm holding onto right now, and I can't help but feel sorry for all of them (except Tante - she can go be a butt wiper in hell).

I can only hope that the newest generation has an easier go of it. Mazarine may not, but she'll have her mom, Delphine, and probably Step-and-a-Half too to help her navigate the prejudices she'll likely face. I hope for the little one's sake that Markus takes a big role in their future too. Also would like Erich to forgive himself and his circumstances, figure out who he is, and reconcile with this past.

I really need to know about Mrs. Shimek. Without giving up a major spoiler, I really wish her why had been revealed. Surely, the why was important!

I NEEEEEEED a sequel to this book! I NEEEEEEED all my questions and hopes for their futures addressed...

[Summer · Rating 1 out of 5]

VERY mixed feelings about this book. The author has some beautifully worded sentences and an overall engaging story (in the sense that it would have made a good screenplay) however, what the author states in the included interview as to her intention for writing the book (1--to show the affects of war and 2--to show the difficulties of immigrants to build a life in a country devoid of familial support or the familiarity of cultural fortification)was at best, used as a backdrop for a story about the friendship of two women. Even the title is misleading as the importance of the club is not even effectively woven throughout the story, but disappears and then pops up at odd intervals. The same could be said of the character from whose perspective the story is initially told; he seems to be only a vehicle for introducing us to the two women upon whom the majority of the novel is focused.

I finished the book thinking that the author's intentions were very poorly implemented and that I felt shorted by the fact the novel left me with no entertaining questions or themes other than wondering why it deserved to be published.

[Doug Bradshaw · Rating 5 out of 5]

Louise Erdrich is the Master writer story-teller. For me, one of the marks of a great writer is their ability to explain and make us feel human emotion and psychology that is subtle and virtually unexplainable. This book is chuck full of such amazing and spot on observations about how people think and why they do what they do to each other.

The story covers the period from the end of WW1 through and beyond WW2 and is about a simple German fellow and his bride who move to the US for a better life and end up settling in a small town in North Dakota and then eke out an existence as a butcher with meat market. At the same time, a local girl with a tough background living without a mother and only an alcoholic father, also eking out an existence with her boyfriend doing balancing acts and shows in nearby towns, meets the Germans and an interesting partnership is born.

Here are some additional random thoughts about the book and contain ***SPOILERS***:

1. The book is very graphic about the world of slaughtering animals, the smells, the cleaning rituals, the ruined hands, the bones molding in the back yard, dogs taking away carcasses and on and on. She must have grown up on a farm and must have experienced first hand the elements of raising animals. There wasn't much left to the imagination. She tells the whole story and I was there experiencing it all with the family.

2. Although the two wars and violence of both wars and the suffering and the odd position American Germans were in is written about, the historical aspect and history of the wars is a minor detail and not the main story. The main story is the interaction over the years between an amazing and lovable female character and the German couple and their four children, most of it set in their meat market.

3. The main female character is young and naive and has had a difficult life growing up. Although the words homosexual or gay were not use then, her handsome and talented boyfriend turns out to be gay. She actually discovers this by observing him having sex with another man in a hidden wooden area. She was far enough hidden and away that she couldn't see the details of what was happening, but it was an excellent and heartbreaking sub-story that seemed so very real that I had to wonder if the author went through something similar. I had to keep thinking to myself that this author, who is three years younger than me and published the book 8 years ago, has been through a lot and has seen a lot and hasn't had a particularly easy life either.

4. There were some minor disappointments. Since her gay boyfriend was such a disappoint to her sexually, I was hoping we'd get to hear that her relationship with the man who became her husband was stellar. But there was never any mention of it. That brings up another of the author's excellent writing skills. Many of the relationships between male and females in the book are paced so carefully and occur with only minor incremental growth and progress that it was somewhat hard on me. I wanted closure now, things to be easier and fixed like I hoped they eventually would be. But it ended up that when I finally got what I hoped was coming, it was more rewarding than it would have been.

5. There is gruesome death here, genealogy that will floor you in the very last chapter, a little fun PG13 sex, death caused by war, extreme and realistic love and caring.

I didn't love the title of the book, but I did enjoy all of the comments about the singing club. Give this one a try. It is truly outstanding.

[Wanda Pedersen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Actual rating: 3.5 stars

When I first started reading The Master Butchers Singing Club, my initial response was “Not another war book!” as I am not a fan of war fiction. Both World Wars do feature in the book, but they do not overpower the story, for which I am very thankful.

I don’t think that I have ever before consciously encountered a book set in the period between the two World Wars and that is odd—it’s a very rich period of history to explore. The author’s style reminded me strongly of Canadian author Robertson Davies (a compliment coming from me, as I adore his Deptford series, which also deals with small town characters). Her characters are very unique and yet they are ordinary people, living ordinary lives in many ways. Alcoholics, orphans, poor people, butchers, singers, Native people, circus people, murderers, undertakers, pilots, children, all making their way through the world as best they can. Erdrich doesn’t make them flamboyantly odd, just the regular peculiar that one finds in small communities. It strikes me that this could have been a Canadian book—the northern U.S. shares many environmental and cultural threads with Canada, I think.

This is probably also the best depiction of a love triangle that I have ever encountered in literature. Several triangle relationships hinge on Fidelis, the master butcher. His wife Eva and her friend Delphine. His sister Tante and Delphine. Fidelis, Delphine and Cyprian. And yet, as his name would indicate, Fidelis is faithful to each of the women in his life. He is the provider for Eva until her death, considers Tante until she returns to Germany, and waits until he is sure that Cyprian is truly gone before proposing to Delphine.

Another pseudo-Canadian theme in the novel is that of identity, a well-worn Canuck obsession. We get to watch Delphine struggle with her lack of knowledge about her origins, and see each of Fidelis’ sons forge lives for themselves and decide where their hearts lie.

So many underlying themes, well written, and thought provoking.

[Julie G · Rating 4 out of 5]

Do not be confused by the title or the cover of this book. This is not, as they are calling it these days, historical fiction. You will not find in this book the cheesy, 3-star variety of historical fiction that book club hosts are choosing so as not to be too terribly distracted from their Pinot Noir. No, my dears, this is a real book.

Actually, this is literature, and it is often disturbing, frequently thought-provoking, and if mine had not been a library copy, properly ruined of its re-sale value by margin notes and folded pages.

I am new to Louise Erdrich (pleased to meet you), and I will return. Soon.

[Linda Hart · Rating 1 out of 5]

Disappointing. Uninspiring. The combination of too many tantalizingly bizarre, yet underdeveloped characters and a sprawling, meandering, messy plot left this book lacking in every area. The book contains unnecessary gratuitous sex, is way too long, and has a gimmicky ending. Because of hearing difficulties, the audio version was difficult for me to understand, so reading may have been a better experience, but still, Erdrich can do better than this.

[Patricia Williams · Rating 3 out of 5]

Yes, I finally finished this book and have decided this writer is just not for me. I tried another of her books and could not get through it. This one had a different subject and I wanted to try it. I did read the whole book but it was a trial. The main character Delphine was very likeable and I enjoyed her story. Some of the other subjects in the book, not as interesting and too detailed. I liked the story but to me, it just took too long to tell it. It was a very good story and this author is an excellent writer, just that all this detail is not for me. I"m sure there are many who enjoy her.

[Mosca · Rating 5 out of 5]

******************************************

Louise Erdrich likes to sneak up behind us and surprise us with what we already know but are trying to forget.

Death and life are the same. Our own lives lead us towards our own deaths as we live from the proteins that we harvest from those other living creatures killed for our nourishment. And we, ourselves, live and die for the nourishment of others.

That which we see around us is so much more than we suspect; but is hidden from us by, not only our own self-imposed illusions, but also by the deceptions imposed upon us by others for our own, and their own, protection.

This book plays out those realities in ways that confuse and deceive us so that we may then learn for ourselves that which we have forgotten.

This is one more gem; and Louise Erdrich keeps making jewelery.

[Jan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a masterpiece! I listened to the book on audible.com with the author narrating. Her voice is gentle and pleasant, and she seamlessly changes with each different character. She even sings to us!

The book is set primarily from 1918 to 1954 and mostly in Argus, North Dakota. The main characters are Fidelis Waldvogel; Eva Waldvogel who befriends Delphine Watzka; Cyprian an Ojibwe acrobat' Step-and-a-Half the town junk collector; Roy Watzka who is Delphine's father and a hopeless alcoholic; and Fidelis and Eva's four boys Franz, Marcus, Emil, and Erich. These characters are some of the most memorable I have ever read.

Most of the characters are German immigrants and Americans of European descent, and Erdrich depicts their lives during the Depression and World War II. Cyprian is an indigenous man and plays a smaller role in the book than I would have expected. The author does not forget her First Nation heritage though and captures the tremendous grief and pain of the massacre at Wounded Knee.

I often wept and then at other times, I found myself chuckling. This is a wonderful book peopled by unforgettable characters in a harsh and beautiful setting where life and death are constantly connected and where a "butcher sings with the voice of an angel"

[Joy D · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fidelis, a former WWI German sniper, marries Eva, his deceased friend’s pregnant fiancé, and emigrates from Germany to Argus, North Dakota, to establish a butcher’s shop. Delphine, daughter of an alcoholic single father, meets Cyprian, a former WWI US Marine, and they create a traveling acrobatic act. They eventually return to Argus and pretend to be married to avoid gossip. Delphine and Eva become fast friends, and the storyline follows their converging lives from WWI to several years past WWII.

The strengths of this novel include deeply drawn characters and an unusual plotline. The characters are complex, filled with internal contradictions. For example, Fidelis is a butcher so he seems rather unfeeling in his work of constantly killing animals, but he possesses a beautiful singing voice and treats his family with tenderness. Even the minor characters exhibit a unique identity and emotional depth.

War and its ongoing impact are recurrent themes. Initially, war affects Cyprian and Fidelis, but the next war wreaks havoc on Fidelis’s sons. The plot includes such diverse elements as the discovery of three bodies in a cellar, a sexual identity crisis, and a tie-in with the Wounded Knee massacre. There are a few brutal scenes, mostly involving animals. Several mysteries get set up and are not always resolved. It is rich in period details and beautifully written. By the end, the author has taken the reader in unexpected directions and several secrets are revealed.

[Stephanie Sun · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sort of a The Shipping News meets Fargo, set in the 1920s, 30s, and 40s. The characterizations are uneven and spazzy; the narrative unaccountably choppy; but Erdrich does captivate and compel here and there.

The best part is the amazing descriptions of food:

"...breakfast of cheese and bread and stewed prunes... ...coriander, pepper, and apple-wood-smoked pork, a rich odor, clean and bloody and delicious... ....every mood of red—twenty or thirty cuts of meat, summer sausage, liver sausage, beer sausage, veal, blood, Swedish, Italian and smoked pepper sausage, glistening hearts and liver and pale calf thymus, sweetbreads, as well as a great box of the delicately spiced, unsmoked, boiled wieners... ...Try this lard. For fish, it is good. Pure as butter!... ...fresh coffee and a cinnamon bun exquisistely dotted with raisins and sugar and butter... ...Old World Quality sausages prepared with the simplicity and perfection common in the German street... ...Marzipan. Herring. Pickles with the right degree of spice. Rolls as soft... ...a jar of dark, cold, homemade beer... ...strong black Turkish coffee... ...cold butter cut into flour for a pastry: pies for the Fourth of July supper to cut the booze... ...a crock of beans laced with hot mustard, brown sugar and black-strap molasses... ...A bowl of oatmeal steaming hot, butter melting in a pool with a lump or two of dark brown sugar. Cream. Sometimes eggs or toast... ...a Hungarian-style goulash, a thick stew of braised meat in paprika sauce, ladled over spaetzle. Sour cream topping it... ...a stack of pancakes studded with the last of the sweet wild blue saskatoons. Dabbed butter on the top. Drizzled on a little maple syrup... ...lemon pound cake... ...fish in bacon grease... ...a baked potato, bacon drippings spooned into the soft meal... ...a plate of beans baked in tomato sauce, a large beer sausage, and half a sweet onion... ...kidney gravy and mashed potato pie... ...creamy oyster soup in a shallow bowl, crackers stuck all the way around it, peppered, a lump of butter on top... ...Traumfeuer on a hard piece of sweet bread and a bit of cream... ...dumpling soup... ...chocolate so dark it is almost black, that tastes of oranges... ...light cheese spread on toasted rolls in the morning, and jams of all kinds. Marmalade... ...sugar cookies in the shapes of animals, fried doughnuts, sausages, bread, hard cheese, apples, and bottles of beer... ...creamed chicken, creamed corn and spinach, mashed potatoes with butter and cream, pies and cookies set out on doilies cut of white paper... ...Country bread thickly spread with real sweet butter, ham perfectly smoked, cured, and cut fresh in a generous slab... ...sauerbraten everywhere we go, or forest venison..."

[Albert · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fidelis, a German sniper in WWI, must report the death of his best friend to his friend’s pregnant fiancé. He falls in love with her and marries her. He emigrates to the US because of the suffering German economy and ends up in Argus, ND because that is where his money runs out. There he finds work for his skills as a butcher and sausage-maker. He soon is able to bring his wife Ava and their young family to join him. Ava meets Delphine and a strong friendship develops. The bond between Delphine and the Waldvogel family (Ava, Fidelis and their four boys) grows and changes them all.

Previously I had read The Round House and The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich, both of which I enjoyed but did not love. My wife had read The Master Butcher’s Singing Club years ago and encouraged me to read it; she felt that I would enjoy it more than the other two. I found it to be, by far in my opinion, the best of the three. I thought the character development in The Master Butcher’s Singing Club was much stronger and felt Erdrich more fully developed and brought to a conclusion several subplots, whereas in the other two novels the subplots felt either too lightly developed or incomplete. I really enjoyed, in The Master Butcher’s Singing Club, the intermixing of Erdrich’s German and American Indian heritage; I felt the contrast of the two enriched the story.

While I am not sure where I will go as far as reading any more of Erdrich’s novels, I do strongly recommend this one.

[Britta Böhler · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5* rounded up

[Jonas · Rating 4 out of 5]

If the author wasn’t Louise Erdrich, I would never have picked this book up based on its title and cover. I would have missed out on an incredible yarn. It is the story of Delphine (daughter of the town drunk) and Phidalis and their respective families. It begins with the remnants and residual effects of WWI. As the narrative progresses friendships are formed, rivalries erupt, there is a singing group, an unsolved (mysterious) death is investigated, a murder that follows, and the Second World War looms.

Phidalis is a German immigrant who makes his way to North Dakota with a set of knives and a suit case full of sausages. He brings his family over soon after. His wife, Ava, and Delphine become friends and Delphine helps with their four sons and their butcher shop. The boys have their own adventures, love interests, and play their own parts in WWII. Louise Eldrich does an amazing job naming and developing characters. Step-and-a-Half has the most memorable name in the book. As with most of her books, the history of Native Americans is represented.

I listened to the Audible version. The author does an amazing job with narration. If you are looking for a unique and surprising story, I strongly recommend The Master Butcher’s Singing Club.

[Ron Charles · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stories rise from Louise Erdrich like smoke from a campfire. Over the past 20 years, starting with "Love Medicine," which won the National Book Critics Circle award, she's produced a series of captivating novels about native American life.

Her latest, "The Master Butchers Singing Club," bears only traces of that heritage, but its appeal stems from the same quality that makes her novels set on the Chippewa reservation so good. Despite her critical success, her sophisticated style, and her clear political interests, Erdrich never forgets that we're still hungry to be carried away by good stories.

"The Master Butcher" opens in the ashes of World War I. A German sniper named Fidelis has married his late friend's pregnant wife, an act of camaraderie that quickly deepens. Graced with an eerie stillness, he sets about the careful task of building a home and forgetting the horrors he saw and inflicted. "He moved from the dangerous quiet where he lived," Erdrich writes, "into the unacceptable knowledge that in spite of the dead weight of killed souls and what he'd learned in the last three years about the monstrous ground of existence and his own murderous efficiency, he was meant to love." Even far from the sacred land of her native Americans, Erdrich knows just how to hover between what's plain and what's extraordinary, building on the life of this common German rifleman a story of legendary proportions.

"Tons of power were behind his slightest gesture," but Fidelis's destiny is shaped as much by the tragedy of world war as by the wonder of sliced bread. Spotting a single piece sent from America one day, Fidelis decides he must immigrate to this land of invention. He packs his knives and a suitcase of "his father's miraculous smoked sausage" and sails for New York, planning to sell the deli goods to pay for a ticket to Seattle. By North Dakota, he's out of sausage, and so he and his family settle there. It's a perfect example of how Erdrich can celebrate the triviality that determines the vectors of our lives.

In the little town of Argus, N.D., Fidelis and his wife meet a young actress who's returned home to care for her father. To Delphine, Fidelis and Eva have the ideal family. But, frankly, the Osbournes would seem like the ideal family to her. She's living with a very sweet acrobat, but he has a somewhat limited set of skills. Erdrich explains that "Delphine soon found that balancing was really the only thing he could do. Literally, the only thing he could do."

After a few months performing together, she discovers that one of the things her partner is balancing is his sexual orientation, a predicament neither of them can understand in a culture that provides no way to fathom their devotion.

Unfortunately, she doesn't have much time to dwell on this problem because when she returns home to check up on her alcoholic father, she discovers a family of dead bodies in his cellar.

It's one of the many marvels of Erdrich's fiction that she can make all this simultaneously ridiculous and normal and horrible. She has such a great ear for the weird comedy of her characters' lives, but she never sacrifices them for laughs.

Delphine's father, a man so wasted by alcohol that he couldn't hear three people calling for help beneath the floor, eventually emerges as a person of great sensitivity. And in the strange union of Delphine and her gay partner, Erdrich explores the interlaced currents of romance, affection, and sexual attraction with remarkable tact and understanding.

The only steady influence in Delphine's life - despite her partner's celebrated balance - is her friendship with the butcher's wife, Eva. With awed appreciation that she never allows to slip into envy, Delphine eyes Eva's fine housekeeping, her four healthy sons, and especially her quiet, solid husband Fidelis. Eventually, she begins working for Eva in the butcher shop and raising the four boys, losing herself in a mountain of work and yet another "marriage" that allows her no sexual consummation.

With the charming rhythm of stories by Isaac Bashevis Singer, "The Master Butcher" moves through the events of this town in small family moments carved into legend by the power of her remarkable voice: the battle of rival butchers carried out entirely through their respective dogs; the courtship of a female undertaker "who already knew the art of using makeup in the next life, as well as this one"; a dying woman's first airplane flight; the collapse of a boy's woodland hideaway. And what's more, Erdrich isn't afraid of loose ends or rough edges. The blurry periphery around these stories remains deliciously ambiguous.

Finding herself again and again a witness to tragedy or its nurse, Delphine "marvels how anyone lived at all, for any amount of time. Life was a precious feat of daring, she saw, improbable as Cyprian balancing, strange as a feast of slugs." To read a novel by Erdrich is to witness that daring feat, performed with the kind of elegance and grace that makes the sweep of one's own life seem a little more miraculous, too.

http://www.csmonitor.com/2003/0206/p1...

[Marc Gerstein · Rating 3 out of 5]

The is an OK book that fell far short of what it could have been, the reason, probably, having to do with the authors revelation in the Acknowledgements that follow the text, specifically, the third and final paragraph in which she acknowledges that members of her family inspired key characters (although I suspect she give short shrift to the existent that Delphine is based on her grandmother).

This is a big, sprawling family saga with intriguing ethnic and historical angles. Normally I love works like this. And normally, I’m flabbergasted, in a good way, by the sort of linguistic craftsmanship Erdrich can obviously bring to the table, and often does in this work. Ultimately, though, I think she was way too close to her characters and stories and did not pull them off as effectively as she might have had she been able to approach them as a novelist. Fascinating story lines get set up, and then seem to dissipate, or vanish. Characters suddenly make bold leaps that leave the reader wondering how they got from there to here; after a while, I stopped backtracking to look for things I might have missed. And the pacing here was odd, verbal flourishes and rich detailed narration is wonderful -- in the right places. But Erdrich goes into it almost randomly and sometimes, it seems to take forever to traverse events not significant enough to warrant the Henry James treatment. And I really wish Erdrich would have been able to find a more artistically satisfying way of delivering the information we get in the final chapter which, as it stands, comes off as a clumsy add-on.

I started with the intent of giving this three stars but I find that the more I write, the more likely I am to talk my rating down. I don’t want to go there since there is a lot here that was enjoyable and engaging; a terrific cast of characters for one thing and some wonderfully offbeat story lines. I’ll just stop here, with the three stars, and wish Erdrich had been able to detach her novelist self from her family memories and make this all it could have been.

[Kirsten · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love Louise Erdrich. Love her.

She is such a nuanced, intelligent, talented writer.

I would read anything she writes. I'd read her shopping list.

Even her weaker novels -- and there have been one or two -- are worth the read, simply for her lyricism and the way she elevates the act of storytelling into an art form.

The Master Butchers Singing Club is, I'm happy to say, one of her best.

Highly recommended.

[Michael Finocchiaro · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was yet another wonderful book by Erdrich about a German immigrant in North Dakota mentioned in the title, but more about the protagonist who arrives a little later in the story. We see the aftermath of WWI, the fracture of WWII, and how the world is changing as the characters evolve and grow. It is a well-written, compelling story.

[Donna · Rating 4 out of 5]

To begin with, I’m a vegetarian, so all the highly detailed butchering of animals in this book wasn’t easy for me to read about, though I don’t believe it influenced my review. Now you would think I’d have been prepared for some butchering, considering the title, but somehow, I thought there would be more singing than slaughtering. Still, the slaying was more prevalent for that of the characters’ hearts and, in comparison, not nearly as much for what went on their dinner plates.

Because each joy in this book had two sorrows to its name. While it may have been realistic, it was hard to take over the course of this book, and it made it seem longer than it was by its page count alone. I do think the author got a little carried away when it came to presenting numerous tragedies, with her skimming over the joyous times to give the reader only a taste of them, but really digging in to spoon up the difficult times by describing them in stunning detail. It made me feel a little bereft, as if “nothing gold could stay,” in the characters’ lives for longer than a few pages at a time.

On the plus side, the characters felt like real people to me, ones I suffered along with and celebrated with on those rare occasions when all was right in their world. And the writing was wonderful and splendidly detailed, bringing those times and places alive for me. That the story was unfocused might be seen as a positive if you imagine it being the same as in real life, but I was never sure who was driving it, making it unpredictable. Just when I thought it was so and so’s story, the focus changed to concentrate on someone else. But everyone in it was connected with three generations interacting to form one cohesive story by the end.

This is the fifth book I’ve read by this author and it was my second favorite behind The Night Watchman. If you read it, enjoy the unique characters and the expressive writing. Just be prepared for big doses of sadness to go along with the spoonfuls of sweetness served up.

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was an oddly disturbing and challenging novel for me to get through, and yet, in the end I felt amply rewarded for my perseverance. I can't say that Erdrich has an easy style -- in fact, at times it is frustratingly obtuse, perhaps even deliberately so, but she still leaves a very tantalizing trail of breadcrumbs that you can't help put pick up after.

Throughout, we explore the weight of history: deeply personal stories of scarred individuals who --much like the rest of us -- struggle to make sense of the progress of their lives, while dragging along the weight of their ancestors. Nicely confined within the ramparts of World Wars I and II, we garner a unique perspective on this era through Erdrich's deformed characters: some in body, others in soul. Unrelentingly, she exposes the tender cuts, and the raw wounds of the butchery of life: a master craftswoman in her own right.

Be warned: it's work, and no mistake that you'll be exhausted by it. I'm not one, like so many others, who found it easy, or gripping from the start. For me, it worked its way under my skin slowly until I came to the realization that I would not soon forget these people because they'd attached themselves to my nerve-endings. The memory of this book will always be raw.

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 stars. Definitely a winner. Truly awesome stuff. Closest book to this for writing quality is Kingsolver's Prodigal Summer. Will be reading all of hers.

[Bari · Rating 4 out of 5]

The book had my complete interest from the first two chapters, but I had no idea initially where the author would take it. It was a fascinating story, or rather collection of stories, particulary how each character's life fell into pattern with the others'. One of the strongest points for me was how she wrote and used time. Some events were written in a sentence or two and others lasted chapters, and it was not about how significant or trivial the event was, but rather it was like seeing each event happen in real time, as the characters experienced it. Thank you Jen for the recommendation!

[Deb · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was a complete and welcome surprise. Wonderful writing and an easy stream of words pull and guide you through this life cycle of a story The Master Butchers Singing Club.

I always seem to detail the shelf life or position of said book as it makes itself known to me. How I became familiar with it. It’s purchase. How long it sat on my hallowed shelves. How it made it to a final cut but then due to lack of ripeness ended up right back in its home snuggled in comfortably with other books hoping to audition again soon for the pleasure of my company. This book is no different. It appeared at the audition several times only to be sent back again and again. Oh but the Master Butchers Singing Club knew it’s worth and did not give up for a whole year, I think and thankfully I allowed it a chance to “show me what cha’ got”.

What I got, was nothing like what I assumed this book to be. This was actually sort of a family/small town saga reminiscent of Fall On Your Knees by Ann-Marie MacDonald or Songs in Ordinary Time by Mary McGarry Morris. I’m actually shocked that Oprah hasn’t gotten her hands on this one yet. (In a good way.)

We meet Fidelis Waldvogel as he collapses in exasperation across his bed in his childhood home in Germany after walking home from the devastation that he survived in World War I. Fidelis, exudes a measure of quiet strength of which benefits carried him safely through the war. Fidelis is a man of extreme honor. After bringing the bad news to his brother in arms fiance’, Eva, he offers himself in marriage and surrenders himself helplessly to an enduring dedicated love. This is the journey of Fidelis Waldvogel, a master butcher taught by his father, who immigrates to American with a suitcase full of expertly made German sausages, sharp knives and a dream. However, the life of this book is complete and this tale would be incomplete if there were not various characters to enhance, dance and live alongside the large presence that is Fidelis in the small town of Argus, North Dakota. Roy Watzka is the town drunk with a secret past. Delphine Watzka is Roy’s daughter who in the future lives a full and complex life but upon introduction is having a complicated relationship with closeted Cyprian Lazzare. Children grow. Seasons change. Residents live and die. The world turns and Step and a half walks the town with her cart full of rags and what not. Ups and downs. Curves and sharp turns. Anticipation, aggravation, justification.. So is The Master Butcher’s Singing Club.

This book has so much, it is hard to be vague and give a review. But believe me, there is so much one could never give away all the nuances and complexities of this book. This was not a difficult read in the least and I enjoyed reading it. It is pretty darn close to a perfect score but falls short for just a few reasons. I make reference to the “life” in this book because it is full of the labyrinth of complexities that surround the various lives. There were various low points and climactic points but always just falling slightly short of “the big one”. Sorrow, but could have been deeper. Good but not perfect, just kinda ok. Possible brimming passion but no.. no, just smoldering. The possibility of tremendous “Wow” climatic points were set up and then.. no, no the characters ultimately are unfulfilled so reader you must also be (in keeping with the concept)… un-full-filled. Yes, Yes, Yes… Noooo. It was a lot without still being enough. Short. Like $.99 cents… enough.. but with one more penny it could be $1.00 a dollar. Just NOT enough. Like a hand full of cereal. It could tied you over but why not give milk, a spoon and a bowl for a meal.. Just NOT enough. Like fun without the happy ending. JUST not enough. I could go on, I won’t. ;o)

Giving it a technical 4 ½ on the Deb score board. On the GR board it’s a 4 stars but know that silently.. (whispers) I give it that half!
Yes I recommend: historical fiction readers, international readers, Readers. It’s good. Good first start to my year of book challenge.

*******SPOILER DISCUSSION/OBSERVATION POINTS BELOW IF YOU DON’T WANT TO KNOW, DON’T SCROLL*********












-Interesting the relationship between Cyprian & Delphine. He needed her and loved her as a sister but because he could not make the romantic sexual connection with the relationship this was just not enough for Delphine. I was glad when she turned down his proposal. To marry him would have been to steal all prospects of true intimacy.

-I was disappointed for all Fidelis & Delphine’s smoldering… it was all smoke with no fire!

-Eva, the ultimate mother was a mother to all. Delphine, due to lack of mothering allowed Eva and Cyprian to mother her.

-I ALWAYS knew Step and a Half was supposed to be her mother but not that she was still adopted.

-The relationships with the grown up sons I felt could have been more in depth.

-I don't know that the title fits because the club is not the focus.

[Diane S ☔ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Review to follow.

[Mara · Rating 4 out of 5]

The master butcher's singing club of the title doesn't really figure into this book at all. Fidelis, the master butcher in question, does start a singing group in his new home of Argus, North Dakota, that's meant to reflect the master butcher's singing club he was a part of back in Germany, as a place where outside grievances can be set aside.

But this story is really about Delphine, a native of, though an outsider in, Argus. It's about her relationship with men, sort of, but really about what she discovers when she meets Eva, Fidelis's wife. In Eva, Delphine discovers the mother she never had, as well as a best friend. That Delphine comes to love Eva's family as her own is fortunate when Eva is struck with a massive tumor. Delphine nurses her until her death and then cares for Fidelis and their sons.

All of this makes for a story that is lovingly told. What threw me for a loop, though, was at the very end of the book when the truth about Delphine's mother is revealed to the reader, but not to Delphine herself. Although I was vaguely interested to have this mystery cleared up, I don't really think it was necessary to the story at all. By including it at the end, it seemed as though we were supposed to think that this revelation was the whole point of the story, rather than an incidental part of the character Delphine became. The answer provided excellent closure to the story as a whole, but part of me wishes Erdrich had finished the book without it.