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A Novel
by Kathleen Grissom
The New York Times bestselling author of the book club classics The Kitchen House and Glory Over Everything returns with a sweeping and "richly detailed story of a woman caught between two cultures" (Sandra Dallas, New York Times bestselling author) inspired by the real life of Crow Mary—an Indigenous woman in 19th-century North America.
In 1872, sixteen-year-old Goes First, a Crow Native woman, marries Abe Farwell, a white fur trader. He gives her the name Mary, and they set off on the long trip to his trading post in Saskatchewan, Canada. Along the way, she finds a fast friend in a Métis named Jeannie; makes a lifelong enemy in a wolfer named Stiller; and despite learning a dark secret of Farwell's past, falls in love with her husband.
The winter trading season passes peacefully. Then, on the eve of their return to Montana, a group of drunken whiskey traders slaughters forty Nakota—despite Farwell's efforts to stop them. Mary, hiding from the hail of bullets, sees the murderers, including Stiller, take five Nakota women back to their fort. She begs Farwell to save them, and when he refuses, Mary takes two guns, creeps into the fort, and saves the women from certain death. Thus, she sets off a whirlwind of colliding cultures that brings out the worst and best in the cast of unforgettable characters and pushes the love between Farwell and Crow Mary to the breaking point.
From "a tremendously gifted storyteller" (Jim Fergus, author of The Vengeance of Mothers), Crow Mary is a "tender, compelling, and profoundly educational and satisfying read" (Sadeqa Johnson, author of The Yellow Wife) that sweeps across decades, showcasing the beauty of the natural world, while at the same time probing the intimacies of a marriage and one woman's heart.
What books have you enjoyed so far in 2025, what books are you looking forward to reading?
...arie Benedict The Jackel's Mistress by Chris Bohjalian Nobody's Fool by Harlan Coban This American Woman by Zarna Garg The Ghostwriter by Julie Clark Crow Mary by Kathleen Grissom
-Shirley_Fentz
What are you reading this week? (6/5/2025)
I just finished Crow Mary by Kathleen Grissom. Great book. Our book club will be discussing on the 19th.
-Miriam_C
To what audience would you recommend The Girls of Good Fortune? Is there another book or author you feel has a similar theme or style?
...randdaughter "the traits that make her 'different' have become all the rage, specifically those from mixed ethnicities like mine." Recently I've read Crow Mary by Kathleen Grissom and Six Days in Bombay by Alka Joshi, which are also about mixed-race characters. I think those who enjoy historical fiction and strong women charact...
-Luisa_H
What are you reading this week? (12-26-2024)
Just finished a YA book, Simon Sort of Says, by Erin Bow. I needed something with humor and this filled that need. I laughed out loud a number of times. Also just finished Crow Mary, by Kathleen Grissom. Interesting historical fiction based on the life of a real Indigenous woman. I'm about to sta...
-Dee_Hatcher
What are some books you loved reading in 2024?
These are a few of the books I LOVED reading in 2024 The Plot / Jean Hanff Korelitz, ( great mystery!) The Undoing of June Farrow/ Adrienne Young There are Rivers in the Sky/ Elif Shafak Tell Me Everything / Elizabeth Strout Crow Mary/ Kathleen Grissom All the Colors of the Dark/ Chris Whittaker
-Laurie_L
"Grissom offers an ambitious account of bravery and initiative inspired by the true story of a Crow woman who married a white man in late-19th-century Montana…With a flashback-heavy narrative, Grissom effectively conveys how Mary's Crow childhood stays with her over the course of her new life. This moving story of one woman's grit, survival, and resilience will keep readers turning the pages." —Publishers Weekly
"Kathleen Grissom is a tremendously gifted storyteller. Here she combines intensive research and her own superb novelistic skills, to unveil one of our nation's darkest eras. In the process she brings back to life her narrator, the real Crow Mary—a native American woman who with love, wit and pure strength of character, not only survives these seemingly impossible times, but prevails against all odds. A riveting tale, beautifully told." —Jim Fergus, author of The Vengeance of Mothers
"My favorite novels shine a light on women that history books have forgotten. Over twenty years ago, Kathleen Grissom heard about an incredible woman named Goes First, and Crow Mary is worth the wait. While reading Crow Mary, I couldn't help but think of My Antonia by Willa Cather, and the debt we owe to the women who came before us." —Janet Skeslien Charles, New York Times bestselling author of The Paris Library
This information about Crow Mary was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Born and raised in Saskatchewan, Kathleen Grissom is now happily rooted in south-side Virginia. She is the New York Times bestselling author of The Kitchen House, Glory Over Everything, and Crow Mary. Find out more at KathleenGrissom.com.
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