Tales Of Burning Love Essay, Research Paper

The book Tales of Burning Love that Louise Erdrich has been writing for ten years, is a novel that takes place in Argus, North Dakota. In which no time period was written. Jack Mauser is the main character in this book. Some other characters include: June Morrissey, Dot Nanapush, Eleanor, Candice, and Marlis.

Jack Mauser, a construction worker, met and married five women, all whom leave him, one through death, and the others through divorce papers. June Morrissery met Jack in a bar and they got married in the same night. Then after June’s sudden death, Jack marries Eleanor, who then blames him for the breakup of her sensational childhood. Later he marries Candice, a high-school girlfriend (now and accomplished dentist) who saves him from himself and decaying teeth. After Candice comes Marlis who in which was much younger and trashier than any of his other wives. Finally, Dot Nanapush unwillingly marries him as well, then that is where all of the fun begins! Later, Dot leaves Jack when she meets Eleanor, who tells her that not only does he have on ex-wife, but three others. In depression, Jack manages to burn his house down, with himself in it. So then Dot and Eleanor plan a funeral during which all of the ex-wives meet up. Then later a big snowstorm hits, and twisting events lead to all four ex-wives into one car. Well eventually the car hits a snow bank, and the women are struck until morning. In which they all share stories of Jack Mauser and tell why they loved him.

Each main character is very important to this novel in one way or another. To take the main character for instance, Jack Maser was a wonderfully flawed character, whose importance was the relationships that he had with his ex-wives. He represented a character who had so much pain in his past from the death of his first wife, that he had nothing else to share with another women but these one night stands. Each women that he has met, must have had low self-esteem at the time, or else they wouldn’t have married such a man in such a short period of time. Most of the women in this story had imperfection also, which meant that they weren’t high class people they were very ordinary, unexceptional women, they had nothing really going for their lives already. The importance to that was that in the end of the book everything turned around after this man died, and each of them have brought themselves a little higher in life. In other words, it is true that some people can have an affect on other people’s lives.

The theme in this novel was pretty much hidden from the reader view point of the book. Mostly it deals with love, devotion, and a simple bond that connects two people living nor dead. Jack Mauser loved his first wife so much that he didn’t want to let her go. Although after her death instead of being lonely and crying, he tried curing it by being with other women. He went through four files of divorce papers to know that the only one he’ll truly love will be her, and killed himself to be with her again. The theme in this story would be probably “death could never do us part.”

This novel was very romantic to read, but yet lengthy and hard to read. Although at the end I do think it was worth it all because of the whole outlook of the novel. The storyline was great, and I loved how the author twisted the plot. Another thing that I didn’t like about the book was how this book and all of her other books connected. If you didn’t read “Love Medicine”, which was another book that she wrote, in which that was the whole beginning of the book. Consequently I didn’t read “Love Medicine” so the beginning was a little bit confusing for me. I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone that is around my age or younger, because it was very hard to understand. Although for an adult this would be a great book, and I’d recommend it to them!

Erdrich, Louise. Tales of Burning Love. New York: Harper Collins, 1996.