Molly Spotted Elk: A Penobscot in Paris

Rating:
Summary: A Tragic Beauty
Review: This is a beautifully-written biography of a young Penobscot woman from Indian Island, Maine. She danced in vaudeville, Wild West shows, and even went topless in New York before dancing before royalty in Europe. She had a passionate but tragic love affair with a French journalist, and fled with her daughter from the Nazis. Molly suffered greatly in her lifetime but shone among her people as a strong matriarch with dazzling basketweaving skills and musical talents. She deserves to have her story told at last.

Rating:
Summary: Moving, romantic, spellbinding
Review: This is a wonderfully lyrical account of the life of a Penobscot woman who against great odds overcomes poverty and illness through her intelligence, love of beauty and dance and her connection to her Native American heritage. Her romance with a French Resistance-member journalist and her escape over the Alps with her infant daughter during World War II is spell-binding. I loved this book!