Quill lives on the Red Pine reservation in Minnesota with her husband and two children. While on a run, she hears a woman's cry, but isn't able to find the woman. Reporting it to the Tribal Police, no evidence is found. Upon returning to the area, she finds an earring which enables her to discover the woman's identity. Along with two friends, she investigates the woman's disappearance and learns of other missing Indigenous women. Since the pipeline construction crews have camps in the area, women and children have gone missing. To her husband's displeasure, Quill puts herself, family and friends in the path of danger. Highlights the indifference to missing and Indigenous women and children by authorities.
#WhereTheyLastSawHer #Bantam #RandomHouse #NetGalley

Book review 😊: 4⭐️ ...... this book is all about courage and not stopping no matter what to help solve the issue with woman going missing. Even though this book is fiction it still holds so much truth in what goes on and happens to Native American woman and children. I liked the mystery and determination that the main character Quill had for wanting to help. This book had me hooked from the beginning. I just wish we had found some answers for one of the main happenings in the book. It left me still wondering and hoping.

A gripping and poignant tale set on the Red Pine reservation in Minnesota, revolving around the life of Quill, a determined woman who refuses to remain silent in the face of injustice. From the moment she hears a blood chilling scream on a run in the woods, the story unfolds into a powerful exploration of resilience, community, and the fight for justice for Native American women.

Quill, the main character, is beautifully crafted. Her struggle to connect with her Anishinabee heritage while feeling apprehensive about how to do so is relatable and deeply moving. A woman determined to seek justice (regardless of the consequences) is inspiring and resonates on many levels. Quill’s husband, Crow, is another standout character. His love and adoration for Quill, along with his dedication to their children, is heartwarming and adds depth to the narrative.

The book's impact is profound, particularly because I am from the same area it depicts. Reading about the harsh realities faced by Native American women, knowing it happens so close to home, made it even more real and heartbreaking. The author does a remarkable job of bringing these issues to light, making the story both educational and emotionally stirring.

I highly recommend this book to feminists and anyone interested in gaining a deeper understanding of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous People/Women/Relatives (MMIP/W/R) movement. It provides a powerful and necessary perspective on what it means to be a Native woman in America, wrapped in a compelling and unforgettable narrative.

Another hit from Marcie Rendon! This is a stand alone (not part of the Cash Blackbear series) and set in northern Minnesota. Native women who are taking back their power to stop missing, murdered Indigenous women. Good character development. Recommended.

A heartfelt novel about a family and community affected by the epidemic of missing and murdered indigenous women that also manages to be a page-turner and a psychologically probing exploration of the long-terms effects of trauma.

Quill has found that the best way to cope with her anxiety is to run. She's training for the Boston Marathon when, on a remote Northern Minnesota road, she hears a harrowing scream. It's the first of several instances of indigenous women from her community and nearby Duluth who are abducted and trafficked or murdered. Though her patient and loving husband wants her to leave it to the tribal police, she feels compelled to get to the bottom of it, even if it puts her and her friends in jeopardy, a trauma-driven (and, while frustrating, well motivated) obsession that threatens to destroy her family.

Rendon has brought a real issue to life in a story that centers indigenous perspectives as man-camps spring up along pipeline routes. It's quite a tour de force. I hope it gets a strong publicity effort.

Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC of Where They Last Saw Her.

I've never read any books by this author before so I was pleased my request was approved.

Readers need to be aware there are TW and CW including sexual violence, domestic and drug abuse, and child abuse.

Where They Last Saw Her is less a thriller, and more of a narrative that spotlights the injustices Native women, children, and men face.

Native women, children, and men are kidnapped, trafficked and murdered at disproportionate levels, and the perpetrators and murderers rarely brought to justice.

When Quill, a non-traditional Native woman and mom, hears a scream in the woods as she's training for the Boston marathon, it sets her on a path to discover what happened to the woman behind that scream.

I loved learning about Quill and her family, her community, their culture and rituals.

I also loved Crow; he's a good man, loyal, a good husband, and provider, and naturally concerned when Quill playing detective jeopardizes the safety of their young family.

I wasn't a fan of the writing style; the narrative is written almost like a summary, recapping what everyone is doing and saying.

This wasn't an easy read due to the subject matter and content but it's necessary to know and be aware of.

Thanks to Bantam and NetGalley for allowing me the opportunity to read and review 'Where They Last Saw Her' by Marcie R. Rendon.

It's a reflection on the importance society places on the abused, disappeared, and murdered indigenous women in the US that I've learned most of what I know about the crisis from fiction - both written and televisual. I was very glad to have received 'Where They Last Saw Her'
by Marcie R. Rendon and am glad to have read and enjoyed it (maybe that's the wrong word in these circumstances) and learned yet more about the thousands of women who have gone missing and the hundreds and hundreds that are abused, take, and/or killed on an ongoing basis.

Set in northern Minnesota the main character in this novel is Quill who lives on the reservation with her husband and two children. Running is her escape - figuratively and literally - and she runs (in spite of the danger) with her friends Punk and Gaylyn and tries to inspire others to do the same. Women and girls begin to disappear with the arrival of a man camp set up for the nomadic pipeline workers who crowd the local towns, villages, and the casino and bring terror and death. Quill tries to beat back the violence and death but for a long time succeeds only in disrupting her marriage to Crow and the lives of her children. Crow is presented as a decent man who wants to protect her and their children and who finds her activism and actions difficult to absorb. It felt like a positive and realistic depiction of a native American man.

This novel is laced through with a familiar (and necessary) strain of generational trauma suffered by indigenous North Americans but by women and girls especially. It's a hard read but very well written and paced. The characters felt real - complex and interesting.

I'm hoping Ms Rendon revisits them at some point in the future.

5 stars

All too real and important. It’s a tough read but incredibly important. It was hard remembering that it was fiction.

The writing was exquisite, and the story was intense and well done with love and respect.

This read was something else. It made me uncomfortable with how easy and crazy kidnapping and disappearances happen so often. Violence with women are still happening and this book depicts it well. Some warning before reading it. Short read but had so much to it.

Compelling, propulsively written, and extremely important. I couldn't put this book down. It's certainly not light reading, so content warnings for violence against women, but it's handled with respect and doesn't feel exploitative in the way some other books in this genre might. I'm glad I received an advance copy of this book and highly recommend it.

This was a really good book that brought me to tears a couple of times. The only reason I didn’t give it 5 stars is that I guessed pretty much exactly what was going to happen extremely early on. Still, it was definitely a worthwhile read.

SPOILERS
.
.
.
.
.

At first, I thought that Quill had a great husband in Crow. And I can understand why he was so worried about her. At the same time, if she hadn’t done the things she’d done, then no one would have found her friend. Instead, she would have been used until she died. The police certainly didn’t care—after all, an officer was behind some of the disappearances. And regardless of what the one good cop said, there is no guarantee that Quill would have been taken seriously if she’d told them where to look. She had been downplayed and/or flat out ignored before, after all.

I think it was a bit messed up that Crow kept telling Quill that her job was to be with her family, instead of supporting her. In fact, his lack of support is what caused her to go look for her friend without anyone knowing about it. Let’s face it—he messed up. Badly.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an ARC. This review contains my honest, unbiased opinion.

This is a beguiling story of the Navajo people as it focusses on how the pipeline workers in Minnesota were able to abduct and engage in sex trafficking of the native women under everyone's noses! Quill and Crow have two young children and when Quill finds an earring in the snow and then a young woman goes missing, she is sure the two are related. Her friend Punk is dating Cliff, the new cop in town but she becomes very secretive and stops running with Quill and their friend, Gaylyn so Quill worries when odd things begin happening around the casino as well. It's a fascinating look at this tight-knit community and how they are protective of their customs and their people and will do whatever it takes to ensure safety for all!
Thanks to NetGalley for this ARC!

WOW - I requested this arc because I loved the Cash Blackbear series..... and this was so different yet SO SO moving. What is so scary, is sadly this goes on in our world every single day. This book deserves to be highlighted and promoted so much more than it is now. I hope everyone takes time to read this one.

The abduction and murder of Indian and First Nation young girls and women numbers in the thousands over the past few decades. Because of blurred jurisdictions over Indian, state, and federal laws, few men are arrested, and even fewer are convicted of crimes.
The women in this story, Quill, Punk, and Gaylene, appear to be reckless in their hunt for several women and one young girl missing from their reservation. Each victim represents an aspect of the reality for Indian women: one is never found and presumed dead, one is found dead, another is brutalized, and another is trafficked.
This is a compelling story that I read in one sitting. Quill, Punk, and Gaylene are not vigilantes. The are warriors in a fight to protect the girls and women, bring attention to the atrocities, and change the story for the indigenous women of the Americas.
Thank to NetGalley for the ARC of Where They Last Saw Her. This is an independent review.

I was given a copy of this book by the publisher and Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Quill has carried the trauma of seeing a young man commit suicide by jumping off a bridge since she was a young child, but she is grown now, married to a good man, with her own kids and friends of her own.

When she is out running, she hears a scream. This begins her determination to find the women who keep going missing from the reservation, even if no one else can.

Not as good as her Cash Blackbear series, but still a thrilling, moving story.

There was one problem with continuity. She said she put venison in the crockpot to make a stew and was going to make fry bread. On the next page, she said she was making drop biscuits to go with the rabbit stew in the crockpot.

I was not familiar with this author but I’ve since seen that she has a series book. I had felt this book almost felt like book one of a series so that fits.

I thought she did a great job of setting the scenes, the characters and their day-to-day life. Sometimes that is overlooked in a book about something like kidnapping or other crimes.

The book is incredibly timely and a good way to get an idea of what is like beyond the headlines about missing woman in these communities in the US and Canada

I've read and loved Marcie R. Rendon's Cash Blackbear series, so knew I would enjoy "Where They Last Saw Her." However, this is a stand-alone story around the issue of missing and murdered indigenous women and children. The story has a strong, older female protagonist as crime solver, and is fast-paced and suspenseful. I highly recommend for fans of Rendon's work and anyone who enjoys suspense/mysteries about missing women and children. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC!
#WhereTheyLastSawHer

I could hardly put this down. First, it’s such an important story sharing the reality of missing indigenous woman and the little effort and attention that goes into bringing them back home safely. This is a beautiful story of friendship and resilience in the face of really shitty white men.

May 8, 2024
This book is a gut punch. It’s very good, super compelling but horrifying. Horrifying because it (or something like it) is happening every day. I had only picked up the book because I loved the authors Cash Blackbear series. This is set today and focuses on the experience of one small reservation community outside of Duluth. The depths of the impact of the generational trauma so many indigenous populations have to deal with are so stark. Add the fear and destruction that have happened from horrible people in the working camps and it’s just tough to read. It’s important though because looking away from a fictional story makes it easier to ignore the real stories all around. It’s very well done and I recommend it.

I received a copy from NetGalley and the publisher to review.

Despite being a fictional story, the author brings to light the reality of the kidnappings and disappearances of American and Canadian native women that continue today. Using an Indian reservation near Duluth, Minnesota, as her setting, the author depicts a scenario where several women go missing and their whereabouts are never learned. It's a cruel world where native Indian women disappear and are forgotten or ignored by law enforcement and the public.

This is a book that should be read by many and discussed by many more. It is an epidemic that is frightening and all too real.