The daughter of French Ojibwe mother and German American father, Louise Erdrich’s family influenced her writing life from an early age. “My father used to give me a nickel for each story I wrote, so at an early age I felt myself to be a published author earning substantial royalties.” Although she started out as a poet, this form didn’t leave her enough room to tell the stories she had gathered from her close extended family. Love Medicine (1984), Erdrich’s first novel, earned her a place among America’s greatest novelists. Written as a collection of interrelated short stories, it features four Anishinaabe families: the Kashpaws, the Lamartines, the Pillagers, and the Morrisseys. Weaving between the 1980s and ‘30s, and using various narrators, Erdrich created a world so vivid it leaked into several of her other books, which are all recommended. Before somersaulting into literary royalty aged 30, Erdrich worked as a lifeguard, waitress, poetry teacher at prisons, and a construction flag signaler ­– all of which provided ideas for her novels.