In the Best of Families

摘要

When author michael dorris committed suicide in April, gulping down a mixture of vodka, pills and tapioca pudding in a New Hampshire motel, he seems to have convinced himself that it would somehow spare his children publicity. Separated from his wife, the novelist Louise Erdrich, Dorris had been under investigation by police in Minneapolis, where the family was still living, for sexually abusing one of their three daughters. (Dorris also had two adopted children; a third, Abel, was killed by a car in 1991.) After a flurry of news reports—Dorris and Erdrich were probably America's best-known literary couple— records of the investigation were sealed to protect the accuser's privacy. The story receded from public view. Dorris's wife and family seemed to have a chance of getting on with their lives.