Gr 7 Up-Michael Dorris's first novel (Turtleback, 1987) comes to life in this fully voiced reading by Barbara Rosenblat. At 15, Rayona is left by her Native-American mother shortly after her African-American father walks out of their lives again, and this time probably forever. Rayona tries to tolerate life with her grandmother, known by all as Aunt Ida, but when the mission priest sexually harasses this tough but insightful young woman, she leaves the reservation and finds her way into a new life in a Montana state park. After a few weeks' idyll as a maintenance worker sheltered by former hippies, Rayona returns to her mother, Christine. The narrative switches to become an account of how Christine came to be the person Rayona has known. Aunt Ida raised Christine on the reservation, along with Christine's younger brother Lee. Lee's best friend, Dayton, plays a significant role in Christine's life right through the time of Rayona's return years later, but Lee dies as a youth in Vietnam. In the novel's final movement, Aunt Ida's brief but substantial story unfolds: Christine, it turns out, is her daughter only by secret adoption, an act with lifelong consequences undertaken to rescue another woman, Clara, from the shame of bearing the baby of Ida's father while he was married to Ida's mother. Rosenblat gives each of these womenranging in age from youth through old agea strength of voice that matches their strengths of character. The symbol of the philandering priest is unfortunately resonant now, but the novel's highly developed iconography of color and elemental forces continues to stand as a literature teacher's friend. Dorris' work lends itself particularly well to oral delivery, and this production is stellar. Francisca Goldsmith, Berkeley Public Library, CA