Crazy Horse's Girlfriend

Sixteen-year-old Margaritte wants out. Out of her small town, where girls get pregnant young and end up stuck, like her mom. Out of a world where drugs are often the only relief. Out of a family where herNative American mother won’t leave her white, alcoholic, abusive father, no matter how much Margaritte pleads. Margaritte hopes if she and her cousin Jake sell enough weed, they can at least escape to Denver one day. That’s when Mike comes to town. Like Margaritte, he loves to read, he’s funny, and he’s Indian–though unlike Margaritte, he’s adopted out, and doesn’t really understand who he is. That’s when Margaritte gets pregnant. Now what’s she going to do? Get trapped like mom? And is Mike everything that he seems?A coming-of-age novel about the female, urban Indian experience, CrazyHorse’s Girlfriend is not only a gritty, unexpectedly funny, page-turning novel about a girl who just wants a little bit more–it’s an instant classic.

Tough, tender, and funny as hell, Erika T. Wurth’s unflinching debut novel, Crazy Horse’s Girlfriend, illuminates the grim world of Idaho Springs. Wurth’s raw, muscular writing takes the gritty story of a pregnant sixteen-year-old drug dealer and transforms bathos into a revelatory journey. Immensely compelling and readable. Couldn’t put it down.
—Eden Robinson author of Monkey Beach

Erika T. Wurth’s first novel, Crazy Horse’s Girlfriend, is gritty and tough and sad beyond measure; but it also also contains startling, heartfelt moments of hope and love. In my opinion, a writer can’t do much better than that.
—Donald Ray Pollock author of Knockemstiff and The Devil all the Time