Touches the Stars

Set in Florida centuries before Europeans arrived on the continent, McKee's ( Woman of the Mists ) tale revolves around Mi-sa, an Indian girl who has inherited the Gift from her father, Atula, the shaman of his tribe. In the past, the Gift had always been passed on to a son of the shaman, who does not marry but fathers children on several women of the tribe. Unwilling to recognize that a girl possesses this skill, and encouraged by a mother who wants her own son to be shaman, the community becomes increasingly suspicious and fearful of Mi-sa, whom they believe might carry evil spirits. Meanwhile Atula faces his own quandary: fond of Mi-sa's mother, Miakka, but unable to protect mother and daughter from the tribe's hostility, he becomes torn between duty to his people and his wish to take Miakka and Mi-sa to live in another community where they can be accepted. By romanticizing aboriginal life and focusing on the literalness of a shamanic gift that can be genetically inherited, rather than on its spiritual dimension, McKee ultimately defeats her own purpose, reducing the mythic to the mundane--or to second-rate fantasy, at best. (Aug.)