In "Madonna Swan: A Lakota Woman's Story, "Mark St. Pierre skillfully weaves together his interviews with Madonna Swan-Abdulla to capture the indomitable spirit of a Lakota woman as she celebrates the joys and endures the sufferings of her remarkable life on the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation in South Dakota.

Born in 1928, Madonna Swan was "winona "the" "first-born daughter-of Lucy High Pine and James Swan. She held a special place in an extended family of grandparents, parents, and ten brothers and sisters.

For the Swans, as for other Lakota Sioux, life on the reservation in the...