With a storyteller's rhythmic cadences, [Anpao: An American Indian Odyssey] chronicles the adventures of Anpao as he persists in his arduous quest for the love of the beautiful Ko-ko-mik-e-is…. Because the oral tradition upon which Anpao's adventures are based includes many diverse elements, the book may be perceived as a unique blending of history and mysticism. These elements range from cosmological stories originating in the multilayered consciousness of a world predating contemporary notions of time and space to tales inspired by relatively recent events, such as the coming of the white man. As noted in the final explanatory chapter, "there is no pan-Indian history, for Indian cultures are far too diversified to accommodate a uniform view of history or to embrace a single cultural hero … the tales of Anpao are selected from a large body of oral history, in much the way that Homer's tales in the Odyssey...