New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988. First edition - North Dakota-born author's second novel, one with stories within stories, with settings ranging from Vietnam to Paris, from 1930's New York to Algeria in its fight for independence, one which "sifts through the legacy of a legendary blues singer - her music, her passions, her gifts for self-creation and self-destruction, as it charts the efforts of her son, a photojournalist specializing in war, to find his unknown father." 2548 pp