Montana 1948 - Larry Watson

This is a short book with a 12-year old narrator. I read it in a one hour session on the elliptical. But for the subject matter, I would have assumed this was a young adult fiction novel given the ease of the language and narrative. David is the son of the town sheriff and the nephew of the town doctor. They live in Montana in 1948 near an Indian reservation. Early in the book - and without warning from the book flap - David's uncle is accused of molesting Indian women during their medical examinations. Confronted with this information, David's father is left to decide between justice and family. The simple way in which the story is told is deceptive, as it is clearly a story about the fact that things are not always as simple as they appear. While life on a Montana ranch may seem like nothing more than hard work, there are secrets everywhere, and personalities and politics constantly to navigate. I finished this book feeling unsatisfied. In some ways it was a little too simple (though the ending was a bit of a shocker). I wanted more devleopment from the characters and their relationships with each other. But, given that it was from David's perspective, I thought Watson did a fine job of telling the story of a traumatic event through the eyes of a child who would need years more of life and experience to ever really unravel and understand it all.