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Elissa Washuta: White Magic (2021, Tin House Books) 5 stars

Throughout her life, Elissa Washuta has been surrounded by cheap facsimiles of Native spiritual tools …

Hard to describe, but intense

5 stars

This book is a lot. It bounces all around in an attempt to compile and associate many thoughts and emotions, with many comparisons of the author's life to media. I really liked it because it felt like it was communicating something more than just words or logical sentences could about her life, her mind, her culture, etc.

Her words speak to the connections we make in our mind between various things, events we remember happening, movies we've watched, games we've played, and how we take these connections and use them to piece together a life's narrative, attempt to explain trauma, or give ourselves a reason to carry on. The book questions whether these connections are caused by something more or if they are just coincidences, and whether, in our investigations, we even want to know that answer. Is it better to be fully grounded in a world full of trauma, oppression, pain and hardship, or should we leave something of the world to mystery or mysticism?