The Sentence

The Sentence by Louise Erdrich is a 2021 novel that celebrates family, Indigenous American identity, the importance of community spaces, and people coming together in love and support. The novel incorporates important events of 2020, such as the murder of George Floyd and the COVID-19 epidemic, as well as contemporary facts about US incarceration rates, racism, and reparations.

Infused with autobiographical allusions to author Erdrich’s own life, the novel explores spirituality, bookstores, stories, and current events as symbolic of the human experience. Erdrich narrates primarily through the first-person point-of-view of the protagonist, Tookie, an Ojibwe (or Chippewa) woman whose character development is informed by a cast of complex secondary characters, including the ghost of a white woman appropriating Indigenous American culture.

Erdrich, the owner of Birchbark Books in Minneapolis, Minnesota, is a member of the Indigenous American tribe known as the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians. A recipient of the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize, Erdrich is the author of 28 books, including The Night Watchman (2020), The Beet Queen (1986), and The Game of Silence (2005).