And somehow (although this link was less clear to me), Faye comes to terms with a significant loss in her own past, and finds a new path. In the present day, the drum calls to someone in a way that ultimately saves their life. The Painted Drum is considered the final book in that series, and the events leading up to the making of the drum finally reveal more about the mysterious Fleur Pillager. And with that story, readers find themselves back in familiar Love Medicine territory. This novel begins and ends with Faye in New Hampshire, but her story “bookends” that of the drum. They learn the drum was sold many years ago to a man who moved east, and the two women travel to the midwest to return it to its original owner and, hopefully, learn more about its origins. When in the course of her work Faye comes across an Ojibwe drum, its impact is visceral and she feels compelled to find out more about it. ( )įaye Travers and her mother, Elsie, have an estate business in New Hampshire, where they are called in to help families value, sell and/or dispose of possessions after the death of a loved one. She sets a good pace and has the skill as a voice artist to differentiate the many characters. Still, I think I would have preferred the book if Erdrich had just focused on the drum’s origin and meaning to the Shawano family, and left Faye out of it.Īnna Fields does a fine job of narrating the audiobook.

Eventually the reader gets all the pieces of the puzzle and the connection between the storylines becomes clear. I found this section, and part three, much more compelling, but I had to wonder what happened to Faye and why Erdrich had just abandoned her storyline. In part two, we have an abrupt jump to the reservation and Bernard Shawano takes up the story, relating how his grandfather came to fashion the drum, and its significance to the family. It’s slow to start and I wasn’t all that interested in Faye’s current love life. From this point the story moves back and forth, in time and location, as we learn the history – and future – of this particular drum. Among the artifacts in the attic is a rare drum. When Faye is asked to appraise an estate, she discovers a that the man who died is descended from an Indian agent who worked on the Ojibwe reservation that is home to Faye’s mother’s family. Faye Travers and her mother run an antiques business in their New Hampshire town.

The Painted Drum by Louise Erdrich