



Where They Last Saw Her: A Novel (Unabridged)
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4.6 • 9 Ratings
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the award-winning author of the Cash Blackbear series comes a compelling mystery of a Native American woman who learns of the disappearance of one of her own and decides enough is enough.
“Rendon shows how harm done to a marginalized community can reverberate through generations [as] the novel hurtles toward a breath-robbing conclusion.”—The New York Times Book Review
A WASHINGTON POST AND BOOK RIOT BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR • FINALIST FOR THE MINNESOTA BOOK AWARD
All they heard was her scream.
Quill has lived on the Red Pine reservation in Minnesota her whole life. She knows what happens to women who look like her. Just a girl when Jimmy Sky jumped off the railway bridge and she ran for help, Quill realizes now that she’s never stopped running. As she trains for the Boston Marathon early one morning in the woods, she hears a scream. When she returns to search the area, all she finds are tire tracks and a single beaded earring.
Things are different now for Quill than when she was a lonely girl. Her friends Punk and Gaylyn are two women who don’t know what it means to quit; her loving husband, Crow, and their two beautiful children challenge her to be better every day. So when she hears a second woman has been stolen, she is determined to do something about it—starting with investigating the group of men working the pipeline construction just north of their homes.
As Quill closes in on the truth about the missing women, someone else disappears. In her quest to find justice for all of the women of the reservation, she is confronted with the hard truths of their home and the people who purport to serve them. When will she stop losing neighbors, friends, family? As Quill puts everything on the line to make a difference, the novel asks searing questions about bystander culture, the reverberations of even one act of crime, and the long-lasting trauma of being considered invisible.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
This powerful, character-driven mystery is a tough one to shake, because it all feels so unnervingly real. Quill is a middle-aged wife and mom on northern Minnesota’s Red Pine reservation. Indigenous women have gone missing or been found murdered in the area recently, but it’s not until she hears a single scream while out on her morning run that something changes in her. Frustrated by the usual lack of urgency from the local police, she begins her own investigation, with the reluctant help of her girlfriends Gaylyn and Punk and her devoted husband, Crow. Marcie R. Rendon is herself a member of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe, and her writing has an insider’s deep knowledge of the area and its culture. Narrator Erin Tripp perfectly captures both Quill’s frustration and her steely resolve. Where They Last Saw Her tackles a hot-button issue sensitively and with empathy while still maintaining the pace and tension of a top-notch thriller.
Customer Reviews
Excellent
It was so good I listened to it all at once! The characters and their relationships feel true, and it feels like the author has true affection for them. Highlighting the MMIWG crisis in a way that is granular, and told from the inside, not only heightens the stakes in the book, but opens up better understanding in real life as well. The reader, actress Erin Tripp, has a beautiful voice that draws you in to the story!