The Master Butchers Singing Club

What happens when a trained killer discovers, in the aftermath of war, that his true vocation is love? Having survived the killing fields of World War I, Fidelis Waldvogel returns home to his quiet German village and marries the pregnant widow of his best friend, killed in action. With a suitcase full of sausages and a master butcher’ s precious set of knives, Fidelis sets out for America, and settles in Argus, North Dakota. Over the years he works hard, building a business, a family, and a singing club consisting of the best voices in town. When Delphine Watzka, a daughter of Argus, meets Fidelis, the ground trembles. This momentous encounter changes the course of their lives, and determines the trajectory of this brilliant new book by one of America’ s most acclaimed novelists. In The Master Butchers Singing Club, Erdrich creates a fictional world filled with memorable characters who grapple with the worst and best impulses of human nature.

"[A]lmost unimaginably rich....Delphine is a great character....And she's the moral center of a sprawling anecdotal story crammed with unexpected twists and vivid secondary characters...crowned by a stunningly revelatory surprise ending....[A] thoughtful, artful, painfully moving addition to an ongoing American saga." Kirkus Reviews

"[E]motionally powerful, richly detailed....Erdrich gives us one of her finest characters in the radiant Delphine...while also creating a host of truly remarkable secondary characters....It's clear that Erdrich, one of our finest writers, is working at the very peak of her considerable powers." Joanne Wilkinson, Booklist

"A substantial, beautifully composed, confident work of art...both expansive in its reach and intimate in its intense focus." O: The Oprah Magazine

What happens when a trained killer discovers that his true vocation is love? Having survived the killing fields of World War I, Fidelis Waldvogel returns home to his quiet German village and marries the pregnant widow of his best friend who was killed in action.

With a suitcase full of sausages and a master butcher's precious set of knives, Fidelis sets out for America, getting as far as North Dakota, where he builds a business, a home for his family — which includes Eva and four sons — and a singing club consisting of the best voices in town.

When the Old World meets the New — in the person of Del-phine Watzka — the great adventure of Fidelis's life begins. Delphine meets Eva and is enchanted; she meets Fidelis, and the ground trembles. These momentous encounters will determine the course of Delphine's life — and the trajectory of this brilliant new novel by Louise Erdrich

What happens when a trained killer discovers that his true vocation is love? Having survived the killing fields of World War I, Fidelis Waldvogel returns home to his quiet German village and marries the pregnant widow of his best friend who was killed in action.

With a suitcase full of sausages and a master butcher's precious set of knives, Fidelis sets out for America, getting as far as North Dakota, where he builds a business, a home for his family — which includes Eva and four sons — and a singing club consisting of the best voices in town.

When the Old World meets the New — in the person of Del-phine Watzka — the great adventure of Fidelis's life begins. Delphine meets Eva and is enchanted; she meets Fidelis, and the ground trembles. These momentous encounters will determine the course of Delphine's life — and the trajectory of this brilliant new novel by Louise Erdrich

Louise Erdrich is the author of eight novels, including the National Book Critics Circle Award-winning Love Medicine and the National Book Award finalist The Last Report on the Miracles at Little No Horse, as well as poetry, children's books, and a memoir. She lives in Minnesota.