At first, Mary resists, but she trusts the man to bring her brother back. A kind man comes over and says that his wife just had a baby and could feed the little one. The baby is soon hungry and begins to cry. After a disheartening day of searching for housing, Adelaide takes the children to a fair, pays for a ride in a plane, and never returns.Īlthough Mary is the younger of the two older children, she takes charge of the situation. After the birth of her baby boy, the landlady discovers this theft and tells Adelaide she and her children must leave by the end of the month. When that money is gone, Adelaide steals silver spoons from her landlady. Adelaide sells everything of value she owns in order to provide for her children.

Adelaide moves her children to a small apartment in Minneapolis where she learns that she is pregnant. When Adelaide's lover dies, she is forced to leave behind everything she has counted on most of her adult life. It is a novel of inspiration, of love, and of forgiveness that will warm the heart of everyone who reads it.Īdelaide Adare has lived on a farm in Minnesota for many years, sharing her life with a married man who is the father of her two children, Karl and Mary. Their lives will intersect at various points, weaving events that will conspire once again to make them a family. After this shocking abandonment, Mary settles in the small North Dakota town of Argus with relatives while Karl chooses a more transient lifestyle. The Beet Queen is a critically acclaimed novel that follows the lives of Mary and Karl Adare after their mother abandons them at a fair to benefit orphaned children.

The Beet Queen by Louise Erdrich