Contents

Idaho Librarian
Vol. 58, No. 1/2

Review

Fans of Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee, this book is for you. Tourists planning on a trip to the Four Corners area of the Southwest will also find this book a valuable tour guide. Many readers are interested in knowing more about the places mentioned in a book. Is it a real place or is it fictional? Where is the place? Laurance Linford, who “served as an archeologist for the Navajo Nation and as Executive Director of the Inter-Tribal Indian Ceremonial Association” (p. xi), has answered these questions in this interesting and well-researched book about the places found in Hillerman’s novels. When one reads a Hillerman novel or is traveling through the Four Corners, this is a book to have at hand. It is a great travel guide for towns and geologic and other features in the Four Corners. The first edition was published before Hillerman wrote The Wailing Wind, The Sinister Pig, and Skeleton Man. These three books include 45 places not found in the original edition, thus the need for this second edition. Since Hillerman is still writing novels, this will probably not be the last edition. I, for one, am looking forward to the next edition and the novels which will necessitate it.

The entries are in alphabetical order. Each entry includes notes on the history and cultural significance of the place. Included in each segment is a discussion of the role that place plays in specific Hillerman novels. Linford has enhanced the entries by interspersing sixty-five photographs of places listed in the book. These pictures are not of the most “important” places since most of “those have been photographed ad nauseam” (p. xvi). Instead he “chose to focus on some of the lesser known places” (p. xvi). That decision has the benefit of identifying some places that otherwise might go unrecognized by many readers. A short bibliography has been included. A Navajo pronunciation guide has been included to “give the reader an idea of what the words are supposed to sound like” (p 305). The index is alphabetized first by the title of Hillerman’s books and then by places found in that book.

I believe that Tony Hillerman’s Navajoland should be found in any library that has the Hillerman novels in its collection. It is likely to find a warm welcome among his many fans. Anyone interested in the Southwest and the Navajo people should also read Navajo Places: History, Legend, Landscape by Laurance Linford (2000) and Navajo by Susanne and Jake Page (1995).