Mary Hatcher lives with a curse—or is it a power that could make her life whole? A Native Pomo woman who comes of age in 1930s California, Mary keeps trying to make sense of her enigmatic family. Strange rumors spread about her. Her stepmother may have taught her how to become a Human Bear, a shapeshifter who can menace and poison enemies. Two men may love her—or love who they think she is. A mystery even to herself, Mary learns to pass between Native and white societies, tenaciously carving her own path as an independent woman. But as she explores love and desire, family inherited and chosen, and the secrets of the natural world, one question gnaws at her: Is she fated to do harm?
Cussed, choleric and often consumed by remorse, Mary is fascinating without being sympathetic. Mr. Sarris has fashioned for her a rough-hewn, splintery narrative voice ... About the inescapability of inheritance, and it is only in delivering her sprawling confessions that Mary begins to accept the powers passed down to her.
