Amy 
historical fiction
The title of The Master Butchers Singing Club is extremely misleading. While there are, in fact, two Master Butchers Singing Clubs briefly described and alluded to in this novel, the storyline is definitely not about the singing clubs. This is simply a story of life during and between the two World Wars for a man, a woman, and their families. I’m not sure this novel would have appeared on my radar had it not been for the title. I had hoped to get more about the singing club and expected it to be about the people in the singing club. So, I’m fairly disgruntled.
Louise Erdrich’s writing is quite poetic and intriguing at times. And there are some memorable scenes in this story. The one about the show with the Snake Man and the spiders even had me laughing out loud with pleasure. However, it was mostly slow-moving and not my sort of novel. There were some mild mysteries and some crazy characters. But, otherwise, the story doesn’t really go anywhere. It skips around and the reader never gets the sense that any story is completed. There are no great resolutions or climaxes. Fidelis and Delphine do the best they can with their lives. And that’s the story. I was happy to have a mystery solved in an unexpected way at the very end. And that’s about the most excitement I can muster for this novel.
I listened to the audiobook and it was read by the author. While I usually love listening to authors read their own novels, because I get their intended interpretation of the material, I found Ms. Erdrich’s soft, breathy voice to be a bit sleep-inducing most of the time. Plus, she has the annoying habit of taking breaths mid-sentence. I got used to it but am only giving her a B for the narration due to these issues. My favorite moments were those when she was reading the part of Roy. She was most animated then and did give life to that character.
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