Dirty Copper
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- $18.99
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- $18.99
Publisher Description
"The stories stand the test of time; blackly humorous, plainspoken, and earthy."—Star Tribune
"In a style austere, direct, and unapologetic, Northrup reveals his own personal trials and the struggles of his community in fictional sketches and poetic anecdotes."—Publishers Weekly
In Dirty Copper, Jim Northrup returns to the story of Luke Warmwater, an Anishinaabe man who returns to the Reservation after serving in Vietnam. This prequel to Northrup's classic novel Walking the Rez Road deals with the emotions and cultural changes Warmwater struggles with immediately following his service in Vietnam. He becomes a deputy sheriff on the Rez, fighting crime and racism, and is bothered by flashbacks of the war, which are intense at first but gradually become less frequent as time goes on.
Jim Northrup is an award-winning journalist, poet, and playwright. His syndicated column, "Fond du Lac Follies," was named Best Column at the 1999 Native American Journalists Association convention, and he holds an honorary doctorate of letters from Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College. His previous books include Rez Salute: The Real Healer Dealer, which received Honorable Mention from the 2013 Northeastern Minnesota Book Awards, and Walking the Rez Road: Stories, winner of the Midwest Book Achievement Award, Minnesota Book Award, and Northeastern Minnesota Book Award.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Luke Warmwater, the Vietnam vet featured in Northrup's short story collection, Walking the Rez Road, returns to civilian life in 1967 after having served his country. Warmwater has just been hired by the Carlton County, Minn., sheriff's department as its first Native American deputy. As Warmwater, who suffers from periodic flashbacks of warfare, tries to discharge his duties, he must also maneuver his way between his racist colleagues and the petty criminals and scofflaws from the Rez who are more often than not his friends or relatives. Warmwater's dreams of the future are shattered, not once but twice, when death unexpectedly strikes loved ones at home just as it did in Vietnam. Leaving the north woods for the big city, a short stint with the Waukegan, Ill., police department only convinces Warmwater that, even there, he can never fully escape from his personal demons; he must learn to dwell with them. Northrup, himself a military vet who fought in Vietnam and later worked as a sheriff's deputy in northern Minnesota, neither sugarcoats the racism directed at Native Americans nor wallows in self-pity in a profound story set against the backdrop of a close-knit Indian community proudly trying to maintain its age-old culture and traditions, despite the obstacles of abject poverty and rampant alcoholism. Often humorous, sometimes unsettling, Warmwater's return is well worth the wait.
