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The Only Good Indians
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The Only Good Indians
The Only Good Indians is a 2020 horror novel by Stephen Graham Jones. It was written during a stay at a rented house in Colorado. It was first published on July 14, 2020, through Saga Press and Titan Books.
The novel centers on four members of the Blackfeet Nation, half of which have left their reservation. Ten years prior, the group pursued a herd of elk in the elder's section of the reservation. After the accidental killing of a pregnant elk and its fetus, they are hunted by the elk's vengeful spirit. After they are successfully killed, the elk's vendetta is redirected towards Denorah, the daughter of one of the four men, who must confront a past she was uninvolved in. The novel explores themes of culture, violence, and womanhood.
A Blackfeet man named Ricky, who left his reservation and works in North Dakota, leaves a bar and finds an elk stumbling into several cars in the parking lot. Ricky is caught outside with the damaged cars by white patron and chased into a field where he sees a herd of elk. Ricky is beaten to death.
Lewis, Ricky's childhood friend, also moved off the reservation and married Peta, a white woman. One night, Lewis sees the image of a dead elk on the floor below and almost falls to his death, saved by Peta. Lewis shamefully recounts to Peta and his coworker Shaney, a Crow woman, an incident where Lewis, Ricky, and their friends Gabe and Cass went to a prohibited section of the reservation to shoot elk. Lewis shoots an injured doe several times before discovering she is pregnant. After burying the fetus, he commits to using every portion of the mother, but a game warden forces him to dispose of it.
Lewis and Peta's dog is found hanging by its tether in an apparent accident, still alive. They nurse the dog back to health, but find the dog stomped to death by someone wearing a pair of boots they own. Paranoid that the elk has returned for revenge, Lewis becomes suspicious of Shaney's behavior, convinced she is the embodiment of the elk spirit. He invites her over and engineers an accident with his motorcycle that kills her. Peta returns home and Lewis startles her, causing a fatal fall. He looks for proof that the women were elk, and, noticing that Peta appears to be pregnant, cuts her open. An elk calf emerges from her body. Lewis takes the calf, hoping to return it to the reservation and end the curse, but is killed by police en route. The elk spirit, seeking revenge on Lewis and his friends, slips away and assumes a rapidly aging human form. Now looking like a teenage girl, she hitchhikes to the reservation.
Cass and Gabe still live on the reservation. They prepare for a sweat lodge ceremony hosted by Cass. Gabe, now an alcoholic absentee father, stops to see his daughter Denorah before her basketball game later that day. Cass and Gabe begin the sweat with Nathan. While they are in the lodge, the elk spirit attacks Nathan's father Victor. Cass leaves the lodge and sees his girlfriend, Jo. She needs the money she and Cass have been saving in a thermos in his truck to visit her family after the death of her cousin, Shaney. Gabe leaves the lodge and finds Cass's dogs stomped to death. Thinking the dogs must have been trampled by horses, Gabe decides not to tell Cass and returns to the lodge, picking up an old thermos to use as a water scoop. However, Cass recognizes the thermos as the one he had left in his truck. Believing that Gabe stole the money, and finding his dogs dead outside, Cass starts a fight with Gabe. Gabe rocks Cass's truck off its cinder blocks, unaware that Jo is hiding underneath, killing her. Cass shoots at Gabe, but instead hits what appears to be Denorah. In guilt, he allows Gabe to beat him to death. Gabe discovers that Cass had actually shot Nathan, and they are approached by the elk spirit, who agrees to spare Denorah if Gabe kills himself. Gabe does, but she reveals that she plans to kill Denorah regardless, as Denorah is Gabe's "calf".
Denorah arrives and meets the elk spirit disguised as Shaney. She tells Denorah the men are out on the horses, and challenges her to an intense game of basketball. Eventually, the elk spirit is unable to hide due to her injuries, and transforms into an elk-headed figure with the body of a woman, pursuing Denorah through the reservation. Denorah encounters Nathan, wounded on one of the horses, and sends him back to alert her stepfather. She stumbles into the site of the elk massacre from her father's youth. The elk-headed woman catches up to her but becomes preoccupied with the site where Lewis buried her fetus. She digs into the soil and her calf emerges from the ground. Denorah's stepfather is revealed to be the game warden that interrupted her father's hunt, and arrives to save her, but Denorah stops him from killing the elk spirit and her calf, ending the cycle. The elk spirit sheds her humanity, and retreats into the wilderness as an elk again with her calf.
Stephen Graham Jones, a member of the Blackfeet Nation, uses his characters and his novel to pay tribute to Blackfeet culture, practices, and life on the reservation all while tackling themes such as leaving the reservation, marriage to a white woman, representation in sports, and addiction. Two of the largest themes are directly displayed on the novel cover; the title and the elk.
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The Only Good Indians
The Only Good Indians is a 2020 horror novel by Stephen Graham Jones. It was written during a stay at a rented house in Colorado. It was first published on July 14, 2020, through Saga Press and Titan Books.
The novel centers on four members of the Blackfeet Nation, half of which have left their reservation. Ten years prior, the group pursued a herd of elk in the elder's section of the reservation. After the accidental killing of a pregnant elk and its fetus, they are hunted by the elk's vengeful spirit. After they are successfully killed, the elk's vendetta is redirected towards Denorah, the daughter of one of the four men, who must confront a past she was uninvolved in. The novel explores themes of culture, violence, and womanhood.
A Blackfeet man named Ricky, who left his reservation and works in North Dakota, leaves a bar and finds an elk stumbling into several cars in the parking lot. Ricky is caught outside with the damaged cars by white patron and chased into a field where he sees a herd of elk. Ricky is beaten to death.
Lewis, Ricky's childhood friend, also moved off the reservation and married Peta, a white woman. One night, Lewis sees the image of a dead elk on the floor below and almost falls to his death, saved by Peta. Lewis shamefully recounts to Peta and his coworker Shaney, a Crow woman, an incident where Lewis, Ricky, and their friends Gabe and Cass went to a prohibited section of the reservation to shoot elk. Lewis shoots an injured doe several times before discovering she is pregnant. After burying the fetus, he commits to using every portion of the mother, but a game warden forces him to dispose of it.
Lewis and Peta's dog is found hanging by its tether in an apparent accident, still alive. They nurse the dog back to health, but find the dog stomped to death by someone wearing a pair of boots they own. Paranoid that the elk has returned for revenge, Lewis becomes suspicious of Shaney's behavior, convinced she is the embodiment of the elk spirit. He invites her over and engineers an accident with his motorcycle that kills her. Peta returns home and Lewis startles her, causing a fatal fall. He looks for proof that the women were elk, and, noticing that Peta appears to be pregnant, cuts her open. An elk calf emerges from her body. Lewis takes the calf, hoping to return it to the reservation and end the curse, but is killed by police en route. The elk spirit, seeking revenge on Lewis and his friends, slips away and assumes a rapidly aging human form. Now looking like a teenage girl, she hitchhikes to the reservation.
Cass and Gabe still live on the reservation. They prepare for a sweat lodge ceremony hosted by Cass. Gabe, now an alcoholic absentee father, stops to see his daughter Denorah before her basketball game later that day. Cass and Gabe begin the sweat with Nathan. While they are in the lodge, the elk spirit attacks Nathan's father Victor. Cass leaves the lodge and sees his girlfriend, Jo. She needs the money she and Cass have been saving in a thermos in his truck to visit her family after the death of her cousin, Shaney. Gabe leaves the lodge and finds Cass's dogs stomped to death. Thinking the dogs must have been trampled by horses, Gabe decides not to tell Cass and returns to the lodge, picking up an old thermos to use as a water scoop. However, Cass recognizes the thermos as the one he had left in his truck. Believing that Gabe stole the money, and finding his dogs dead outside, Cass starts a fight with Gabe. Gabe rocks Cass's truck off its cinder blocks, unaware that Jo is hiding underneath, killing her. Cass shoots at Gabe, but instead hits what appears to be Denorah. In guilt, he allows Gabe to beat him to death. Gabe discovers that Cass had actually shot Nathan, and they are approached by the elk spirit, who agrees to spare Denorah if Gabe kills himself. Gabe does, but she reveals that she plans to kill Denorah regardless, as Denorah is Gabe's "calf".
Denorah arrives and meets the elk spirit disguised as Shaney. She tells Denorah the men are out on the horses, and challenges her to an intense game of basketball. Eventually, the elk spirit is unable to hide due to her injuries, and transforms into an elk-headed figure with the body of a woman, pursuing Denorah through the reservation. Denorah encounters Nathan, wounded on one of the horses, and sends him back to alert her stepfather. She stumbles into the site of the elk massacre from her father's youth. The elk-headed woman catches up to her but becomes preoccupied with the site where Lewis buried her fetus. She digs into the soil and her calf emerges from the ground. Denorah's stepfather is revealed to be the game warden that interrupted her father's hunt, and arrives to save her, but Denorah stops him from killing the elk spirit and her calf, ending the cycle. The elk spirit sheds her humanity, and retreats into the wilderness as an elk again with her calf.
Stephen Graham Jones, a member of the Blackfeet Nation, uses his characters and his novel to pay tribute to Blackfeet culture, practices, and life on the reservation all while tackling themes such as leaving the reservation, marriage to a white woman, representation in sports, and addiction. Two of the largest themes are directly displayed on the novel cover; the title and the elk.