The Bingo Palace

In The Bingo Palace, American novelist Louise Erdrich writes in the same vein as her previous fiction books in the Love Medicine series—Love Medicine, Tracks, and Beet Queen—which document the complex realities of daily life on a fictional Chippewa, or Ojibwe, reservation in North Dakota. The Bingo Palace primarily follows Lipsha Morrissey, the story's protagonist, as he returns from life in the city to his home on the reservation and becomes reconnected to his spiritual and cultural roots while pursuing a new love interest. Published in 1994, the narrative is categorized under the romance genre, although it includes themes of tradition and spirituality. This book is the fourth in the series, followed by Tales of Burning Love, The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse, Four Souls, and The Painted Drum.

The Bingo Palace alternates between two narrators, Lipsha and presumably the tribal spirits who watch over Lipsha. The story begins with Lulu Lamartine, Lipsha's grandmother, walking to the post office and removing the wanted poster of her son, Gerry Nanapush, from the wall. She makes a copy of the picture and sends it in a package to Lipsha, who is living in Fargo, North Dakota and working at a sugar beet factory. Despite Lipsha's academic potential—he got a high score on the ACT in high school and many thought he was destined for great things—most of the members of his community think of him as a deadbeat, a man with no steady job or direction who is wasting his life smoking dope in the city.

When he receives the package, Lipsha decides it is time to return home to the reservation where he was raised. He has an awkward encounter at one of the reservation dances and realizes that after his time away, he no longer feels comfortable in the routine of life on the reservation. At the dance, he catches a glimpse of Shawnee Ray Toose, who he becomes infatuated with. He decides to pursue her, despite the many factors working against their love.



Shawnee Ray has a son with Lipsha's uncle, Lyman Lamartine. Shawnee and her child were taken in by Zelda Kapshaw, Lipsha's aunt, who cares so much about appearances that she wanted to give the community the impression that Shawnee is eventually planning to marry Lyman. However, Shawnee and Lyman previously decided not ever marry, and so Lipsha becomes a resource in Zelda's plot to restore Shawnee and her son's honor. Zelda hopes that by dating Lipsha, Shawnee will either make Lyman jealous and spark his passion for her, or she will become so fed up with Lipsha's antics that Lyman will begin to look like a catch. While this is happening, Lipsha begins to work at the Bingo Palace, the small-time bingo emporium, bar, and casino that Lyman opens on Lulu Lamartine's tribal land to take advantage of his people's love of gambling.

Lipsha's spiritual awakening is prompted by his dead mother, who comes to him one night while he is working. Lipsha is employed to clean the casino, and his mother's ghost appears to give him winning bingo tickets. Even though the apparition reminds the misguided Lipsha of his spiritual connections, he still invests his winnings into one of Lyman's schemes, which would ultimately desecrate sacred tribal lands, all for the sake of winning over Shawnee. After the appearance of his mother, Lipsha also divulges that he is still battling with early childhood trauma. When he was an infant, his mother threw him in a sack and tried to drown him, and Lipsha was only saved by chance. Because of his trauma, Lipsha struggles with his own luck, his past, and where he fits on the reservation. It is only after losing both Shawnee and his new wealth that Lipsha begins to spiritually reconnect with his values, his people, and his land.

More than just a love story, The Bingo Palace is a commentary of life on reservations. It depicts how Native Americans struggle to maintain a connection to their cultural heritage while working through historical trauma and a lack of financial resources. The novel asserts the value of finding one's place in one's heritage and the ultimate value of love between all people.



Louise Erdrich is an award-winning novelist, nonfiction writer, and children's book author. She has written dozens of books and has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Pushcart Prize in poetry, an Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for her novel The Plague of Doves, a National Book Critics Circle Award, and many others for lifetime achievement in fiction writing. Erdrich is a member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians, known also as the Chippewa or Ojibwe tribes, and her books take Native American characters as their primary focus. She is the owner of Birchbark Books, an independent bookstore with a focus on Native American literature and is considered a primary figure in the Native American Renaissance movement of the late 1960s to the present day.