We stare at each other because we don't know which tribe, and then nod at the last possible instant. Standard procedure. You pick it up the first time a white friend leads you across a room just to stand you up by another Indian, arrange you like furniture, like you should have something to say to each other.
As one character after another tells it in these stories, much that happens to them does so because "I'm an Indian." And, as Stephen Graham Jones tells it in one remarkable story after another, the life of an Indian in modern America is as rich in irony as it is in tradition. A noted Blackfeet writer, Jones offers a nuanced and often biting look at the lives of Native peoples from the inside. A young Indian mans journey to discover America results in an unsettling understanding of relations between whites and Natives in the twenty-first century, a relationship still fueled by mistrust, stereotypes, and almost casual violence. A character waterproofs his boots with transmission fluid; another steals into Glacier National Park to hunt. One man uses watermelon to draw flies off poached deer; another, in a modern twist on the captivity narrative, kidnaps a white girl in a pickup truck; and a son bleeds into the father carrying him home.
Rife with arresting and poignant images, fleeting and daring in presentation, weighty and provocative in their messages, these stories demonstrate the power of one of the most compelling writers in Native North America today.
"Jones' prose hums with a grim intensity as he captures scenes from fractured worlds."—Express-News
"A collection of gutsy, ethereal stories about being Indian in the 21st Century. . . . These stories are disorienting—and meant to be—as though they bend each eye in a slightly different direction and then ask us to walk some fine, unseeable line."—Montana Magazine
"Gripping and visceral reading. . . . [I]n his evocation of young men grasping for hope while ruled by anger and helplessness, Jones shows talent."—Publishers Weekly
"The concluding story, 'Discovering America,' brilliantly encapsulates the whole collection. . . . Jones' sardonic tale reveals the sort of casual stereotyping and prejudice that never seems to disappear."—Booklist
"He delves into lingering stereotypes, mistrust, and violence, evoking sometimes brief, but poignant even hurtful images. . . . A must read for any lover of short stories."—Roundup Magazine
"Jones' most powerful writing stems from his attempts to reconcile the two cultures by which he defines himself—or finds himself defined."—Southwestern American Literature
"Jones reveals so much in Bleed Into Me that so many of us either can’t see, don't notice, or won't acknowledge about those we consider socially beneath us. Jones sees this world, its parallels between beauty and despair, grace and turmoil, and describes it with originality and stylistic flair. Jones's vision is unflinchingly peculiar. It’s also a vision like no other."—Thomas Scott McKenzie, PopMatters.com
"He captures the peculiar outsider perspective of a people who live in white American society without ever really becoming a part of it, internalizing its values. Jones is a voice from the edges…. Jones asks deep questions, and his writing is often poetic and his voice unique. By taking a look at those who are on the outside looking in, maybe we can see ourselves better."—Advocate
"Jones weaves his prose with metaphorical fluidity that will no doubt change the face of literature within the next few years. . . . With a focus on Native American literature, this author will challenge readers more than any other current author."—Eagle Online
"The need for lyrical storytelling persists, and these stories are worth reading more than once. The purpose of Jones' stories is to make a human connection, which he does in every story. These characters are not necessarily the people you will meet in every corner grocery or coffee shop, but they are very real. And that is the point."—Megan R. Rooney, Daily Nebraskan
"As Stephen Graham Jones tells it in one remarkable story after another, the life of an Indian in modern America is as rich in irony as it is in tradition. A noted Blackfeet writer, Jones offers a nuanced and often biting look at the lives of Native peoples from the inside."—NewPages.com
"I thought these stories were amazing. A Native Stuart Dybek, clean prosewith a skewed lens and a biteyes, this is it."—Diane Glancy, author of Designsof the Night Sky
"Stephen Jones is a visionary storier; he has created marvelous, fantastic narratives at the ironic edge of ordinary experience and reality."—Gerald Vizenor, author of Hiroshima Bugi: Atomu 57
"This collection of stories about the life of the Indian in modern America reveals irony, humor, misunderstanding, distrust, and tragedy."—Denver Westerners Roundup
"Jones, a Blackfeet writer, offers a potpourri of stories about the life of an Indian in urban America. The vignettes are filled with ironic humor."—Tuscon Public Library Website