The Bone Whistle: Eva Swan

The natives of a Dakota reservation have long told tales of other, ancient beings who live beneath the hills, having fled there after the coming of the white man was foretold. These beings, these...wanaghi, while similar to their descendants in appearance and ideas, have their own agendas and not all of them appreciate the mingling of the races. Some of them will go to any lengths to stop it. When Darly, half-human and half-wanaghi, gets caught up in the war, she must decide who she will fight for and what she believes.

Though she was born on the Dakota reservation and returns each summer with her mother, Darly has never felt any connection with, or real interest in, her native roots. She has grown up with the knowledge that her father is dead and her mother has worked her fingers to the bone to give Darly a good life, an education, and the shot to be something. Unfortunately Darly's hard work starts to fall apart when her relationship with her white boyfriend falls apart. He finds he is simply unable to get past his own prejudice to accept her for what she is and Darly is unable to move past the heartbreak. When Darly and her mother make their annual summer return to the reservation, her twentieth summer, Darly vows it will be her last until she arrives and finds that everything she has held true, including the fate of her father, was a lie. Suddenly, within the space a few short days an entire new world underneath the Dakota mountains is opened up to her, as well as a possible new love, new abilities, and ideas about things that she never thought could possibly exist. Will she be able to accept this new information and the changes it will bring to her life or is her heart closed forever?

As with previous releases from the relatively new imprint Juno, this book is a stunner. Much like a steaming espresso, it's a great shot of really hot, really tight fiction poured into small package that packs a hard punch. And I must say, it's about damn time we heard something from this sector. Faery fiction is always flooding out of places like the British Isles and France. Even Asia and the Viking-lands have their own faery stories, but it's rare to hear anything from the Native American side. I truly enjoyed this piece, as I have with most of the Juno selections, and I'm hoping that a sequel is released as one is truly needed.
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Paperback: 224 pages
Publisher: Juno Books (February 1, 2007)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0809557924
ISBN-13: 978-0809557929
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