Jump to ratings and reviews
Rate this book

Chippewa #1

Savage Obsession

Rate this book
Orphaned by a brutal attack, Lorinda fins her fate further imperiled when she is kidnapped by a lustful trapper, until Yellow Feather, chief of the Chippewa, rescues her and fulfills her heart's desires. Reissue.

431 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1983

19 people are currently reading
1058 people want to read

About the author

Cassie Edwards

163 books419 followers
Edwards began writing romances in 1982 and released her 100th novel, Savage Skies, on August 28, 2007. Although her earlier books were classic historical romances, the vast majority of her novels involve Native American tribes. Edwards's grandmother was a full-blooded Cheyenne. Her first 99 books sold a combined 10 million copies as of August 2007, with her more recent novels averaging sales of 250,000–350,000 copies.

Edwards has won the Romantic Times Lifetime Achievement Award and the Romantic Times Reviewer's Choice Award, as well as being named one of Affaire de Coeur's top ten favorite romance writers. Edwards has a reputation for meticulously researching the proper anthropological backgrounds of each tribe she writes about.

Edwards and her husband Charles, a retired high school biology teacher, have been married for over 50 years. They have two sons, Charles and Brian, and three grandchildren. The family lived in St. Louis, Missouri for over thirty years, but now reside in Mattoon, Illinois.

Ratings & Reviews

What do you think?
Rate this book

Friends & Following

Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!

Community Reviews

5 stars
323 (56%)
4 stars
123 (21%)
3 stars
86 (14%)
2 stars
26 (4%)
1 star
18 (3%)
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
Profile Image for Jena .
2,313 reviews2 followers
April 24, 2023
Another DNF for me from this author. Obviously, she’s not for me, although this book wasn’t as badly written as the last one.

I went looking for some old, bodice ripping Native American romance and no bodice got ripped here.
But her parents got scalped.😑
It wasn’t the H who did the scalping.

We have the non-warring, “gentle,” Native American H with 2 wives (pregnant wife at that), failing in love at first sight with the h.
And he says I love you within 24 hrs.😑
She thinks she loves him too within 24hrs.
Her parent got scalped 3 days ago by Indians, she walked in and saw her pops brain, and she’s insta in love with one?😒

I actually love real soulmates, love at first sight reads, but only when it’s done well.
This author can’t pull it off. It turned into cheese fest..
DNF.

Didn’t read far enough to give full safety spoilers, but the books corny. Stay away. Also, for people looking for angsty, emotional books, this isn’t for you either. The writing is just not there.


DNF 50% - spoilers


- safety thus far : he had 2 wives, and one of them were preg with his first son. - The H is next in line to be Chief, so that first born sons wife had the prestige.

His wives, even before the h got involved, were constantly bickering in jealousy, and one day, his 2nd wife(the one not preg), chopped off his 1st wives braids, and then divorced him in anger.
- both Indian wives are beautiful, but his first wive is especially so.

- H tricked the h into marrying him Indian style. She didn’t know his wife was preg, it was an angsty scene when she meets her and finds out. The h had already slept with him at this point. The first time they had sex, she didn’t know he was married.

- the 1st wives was heartbroken to see that H had married for the 3rd time too..😑🥹
- Then the H expected the h to cater to the preg wife- do her chores etc- and sleep in the same teepee “with them.”😑
- In his inner dialog, he said he didn’t want to or planned on having sex with the first wife again.
- But he did cuddle with the first wife. Hugged her, comforted her, showed her tenderness, worried about her… he rubbed her preg belly constantly, he cared about her, but he didn’t love, love her. This wive was sweet and nice too, she could’ve bee a heroine, so it angered me to see her get cheated on.

- after seeing the preg wife ☝🏼- the h still willingly had sex with him…is where I had a problem with this boring book, and had to DNF.
- Yes, the h wouldn’t accept being his 3rd wife, or sharing him, but she had a betraying body thing going on and she never followed through with anything.

I get that it’s the culture to have multiple wives, but this girls American and she’s here sexing up a married man with a preg wife just few feet away ( not in the same teepee when this took place the first time), no thanks. 🤡

- 🫢🫢But then…. You find out that the baby isn’t even the H’s.
You see, the sweet Indian wive #1 was actually cheating on him the whole time with his bestfriend, and they had planned on making their son a chief one day.



#cheating
Profile Image for Blue Falcon.
432 reviews50 followers
July 6, 2018
This review is of “Savage Obsession”, book #1 in the “Chippewa” series by Cassie Edwards. (Note, only the first two books in the “series” appear to be related to each other).

The book begins in Minnesota in 1859 in a remote area outside of modern-day St. Paul. It is here that Lorinda Odell, 17, the heroine of the book, lives with her father, Derrick, her mother Mavis, and her 5 month-old sister, Amanda. The Odells are not a well-off family, and so Derrick’s sister, Rettie, who owns a boarding house in town, urges Derrick and Mavis to let Lorinda stay with her for a better life. They reluctantly agree.

Lorinda runs into problems in town, however, namely being accosted, kidnapped, and nearly raped by Lamont Quimby, owner of a mining camp and one of Rettie’s boarders. She is saved from him by Yellow Feather, the hero of the book. Yellow Feather is the son of-and therefore future chief of-a band of Chippewa Indians led currently by his father, Chief Wind Whisperer.

As their relationship deepens, Lorinda and Yellow Feather face many challenges:

The kidnapping of Amanda by Sioux Indians after they kill Derrick and Mavis; Amanda is later rescued.

Another villain, Silas Konrad, who tries to rape Lorinda.

Flying Squirrel, Yellow Feather’s friend, who is far less a loyal friend than Yellow Feather believed at one time.

Foolish Heart: Before being banished for her actions, she was one of Yellow Feather’s wives; another wife, Happy Flower, is pregnant with his child. She is used and abused by Quimby before being abandoned.

By the end of the book, Amanda is found, Lorinda and Yellow Feather-somewhat-reconcile with Rettie, Lorinda gives birth to a son, Gray Wolf-who gets his own story later-and Lorinda and Yellow Feather have their Happily Ever After.

Upside: Mrs. Edwards does a lot of research into her Tribe of the Book that she writes about, and it shows.

Downside: Although I am a fan of Mrs. Edwards-mostly for her love scenes-I am also not unaware of her many issues as a writer (Mrs. Edwards career essentially ended after being accused by the romance novel blog “Smart Bitches, Trashy Books” of being a plagiarist. Then there is the fact that Mrs. Edwards’ novels, especially her Native American books, are horribly formulaic. That formula, which is on full display in “Savage Obsession”, goes like this:

Beautiful, innocent, naive, sweet heroine, who is almost always Anglo, meets and falls in love with handsome, noble, strong, Indian brave, who is ALWAYS either the chief or son of-and therefore future chief-of his band of the the Tribe of the Book.

After they fall in love, the hero and heroine’s love is threatened by the Evil White Man, the Evil Indian Brave, and/or the Evil Indian Maiden. While these efforts ultimately fail, the Evil characters do manage to cause the hero and heroine pain and suffering before the hero and heroine find happiness. (All of the above characters appear in “Savage Obsession”. Quimby and Konrad are the Evil White Men, Flying Squirrel is the Evil Indian Brave, and Foolish Heart fills the Evil Indian Maiden quota).

I didn’t find either Lorinda nor Yellow Feather particularly likeable. Lorinda is whiny-although to her credit she kills Quimby as he’s trying to rape her-but Yellow Feather is an obnoxious, unfeeling individual whose verbal tone toward Lorinda is described-constantly-by Mrs. Edwards using the adjective “flatly”. The “romance” between Lorinda and Yellow Feather is very much a Stockholm-Syndrome type of romance with little to no passion or tenderness.

Sex: Mrs. Edwards love scenes are the best part of her books for me. They aren’t super erotic all the time, but she is willing to occasionally add some pepper to the soup.

Violence: “Savage Obsession” contains scenes of assault, battery, attempted rape, and murder. Most of the scenes aren’t graphic.

Bottom Line: Mrs. Edwards’ books are like going to a fast-food chain restaurant. You pretty much know what you’re going to get. From what I read of others reviews of her books, there is no middle ground with Mrs. Edwards' work; some love her, and others absolutely hate her. I’m kind of in the middle. “Savage Obsession” won’t make anyone a fan of Mrs. Edwards’ work who wasn’t already one.
Profile Image for Lady Tea.
1,776 reviews126 followers
March 25, 2024
Rating: 1.7 / 5

Started off okay, but let's just say that this is NOT Cassie Edwards's finest read.

To put into perspective what's wrong with this book is quite simple: the hero character, Yellow Feather, already has two wives when meeting the heroine.

------------------------------------

And yes, they DO feature as characters, unfortunately.

Note to anyone doing historical romances: forget the realism on this one, because having multiple wives is a HUGE turn-off for romance fans.

Sorry, not sorry, NEXT!
Profile Image for Kristine.
12 reviews4 followers
August 2, 2013
This was the first book I read by Cassie Edwards... It immediately captured my interest and held it through the entire story just as all of her books have done since... I became a fan of hers that day with this book n would highly recommend Savage Obsession or any of her books to anyone looking for a great author of awesome stories!!! Love love love her books!!!
Profile Image for Pat.
1,316 reviews
March 21, 2013
A friend gave me some of Cassie Edwards books, and I'd heard she had a lot of period detail about American Indians. However, I just could not read this book. It...made...me...gag. I'm sure someone will be thrilled to find it and its fellows at a library used book sale.
Profile Image for Sarah.
58 reviews2 followers
September 21, 2016
Racist. Why did I read so many? Out of hope she'd stop being racist oh and train crash mentality.
Profile Image for Vicki.
1,703 reviews
November 18, 2020
Tense romance and an obsession that ends in death. Great read.
347 reviews
September 14, 2021
I've been reading the Savage Series alphabetically, thinking they're all stand alone stories. I enjoyed reading this, but wish I had done it before reading the book that follows this one.
36 reviews
July 7, 2011
Lorinda (Red Blossom) was kidnapped from her aunt's house by Lamont Quimby.Lorinda was going to school. Red Feather rescued Lorinda, they fell in love & got married. Red Feather became Chief after his father passed away. They had one son and expecting another child at the end of the book. Don't know if I will read again or not.
4 reviews
July 22, 2016
I can't believe this book. I've read a couple of these books, hoping the second would be better than the first. Nope. Ms. Edwards uses so many cliches and recycles them through two books it felt like I was reading the same thing the second time!
Profile Image for Rob Hood.
150 reviews27 followers
June 20, 2011
What began with great promise became a great chore to finish. This is way too slow!
Profile Image for Shannon.
Author 2 books17 followers
March 22, 2012
sometimes like slogging through quicksand.
Profile Image for Janet Meeks.
66 reviews
March 16, 2013
I liked the story line, but I always find it distracting when I have it read a language I do not know. It did get kind of repeatitive . But a good easy read.
2 reviews
June 5, 2013
I got bored reading this book and I really didn't like how much Lorinda complained about pretty much everything.
Profile Image for Amanda.
389 reviews
November 12, 2015
Stories that take me to another time. I love Ms. Edwards way with words and how she mends the story with actual facts and language from those Native American tribes.
Profile Image for Denise Koopman.
1,198 reviews4 followers
August 6, 2018
I read all these books a long time ago. Like 20 years. I love all her books. They are romance books about Indians. Love every one of them. A couple was not as awesome as the others but I read them anyway. I was at work the other day and came across one and thought I would read them again. I had a whole bunch in my own personal selection. Awesome books. I love books about Indians.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews

Can't find what you're looking for?

Get help and learn more about the design.