Where Rabbits Gathered

In the high desert cliff-dwelling city of Puye, a young astronomer apprentice named Blue Water is about to become a mother. In the Tewa society in which Blue Water lives, women are the keepers of power, property and wisdom. The collective belief system is one of reverence and awe for nature and her many circular cycles. Here, in the warmth of a hardworking philosophical community concerned with balance and beauty, the arid mountainous land provides-corn, beans, and squash from the farmers; deer, elk and buffalo from the hunters; wild onions, chokecherries and more from the gatherers. But this balance is fragile. Drought forces the 1500 people of Puye (whose name means Where Rabbits Gathered) to leave the cliffs of the massive butte that has been home for 100 generations. Blue Water journeys with the others to Big River, where they build Singing Water Village, a stable adobe farming settlement. Here, Blue Water's daughter North Star is raised. Wild-hearted,...