This has an interesting premise and the insight into how reservations operate as separate entities was something that, as a Scot, I didn't know much about and I enjoyed learning a little more. To be honest though, I found myself googling a bit too often, looking for explanations of terms or cultural references that I didn't know and didn't get from the context. I'm certainly not criticising the book for being steeped in its own culture, but I suspect it would work better for people familiar with that culture. I found it a slow and meandering read, drifting back and forward between the election and the narrator's grief for his mother, who died ten years earlier. It lacks momentum - at a quarter of the way through I still had no feel for where it was heading. I'm afraid I gave up at that point. Somehow it just wasn't holding my attention and there was nothing that was compelling me to keep turning the pages. It's well written, though, and both setting and characters are well drawn. I suspect it's a simple case of wrong reader, wrong book.

An interesting novel on the politics of a reservation, following the tribal chief before the election. It had lots of interesting themes - family, politics, tribal identity (and who gets to be enrolled and who doesn't), resentment and corruption... I found it really interesting but the pace was a bit slow and the action took a while to develop, with a lot of dialogue that didn't seem to bring a lot to the plot. I liked the characters and I thought their emotional lives were well described and easy to get into. Overall it was enjoyable but the slow pace put me off a bit.

Big Chief follows Mitch who returned to Passage Rouge, the reservation that he grew up on after going to law school and his mothers death. Mitch is an outsider to the tribe and he wanted to make a difference to the tribe but ends up getting sucked into the world of Mack Plum who is the Tribal President. Politics isn’t perfect and Mitch starts to feel uncomfortable at the abuses of power he and Mack have done. It’s the next tribal election and Mitch has to contend with what he has done and if he can support Mack.

This was okay but honestly I found it quite boring. The writing was good and there was nothing wrong with the story, it just didn’t quite work for me. I think the political landscape was interesting but the author just didn’t do enough with it. Personally I think Winter Counts by David Heska Wanbli Weiden is a better story that deals with a Native tribe, politics and issues.