Cry Dance is Helen Bonner’s breakthrough novel.  She is the author of two classic memoirs, Laid Daughter and First Love Last.

What if you knew there is no death?  How would it change your life?  Growing up clairvoyant in a reservation town wasn’t easy, but before her time in L.A.’s jail, Lorinda LeClair was Homecoming Queen, lead singer for the Bishop Babes, best bud of  Bonnie, humorous Paiute, and girlfriend of the sweetest guy on the basketball team. Orphaned at six, she still has occasional visits from her deceased mother, who reminds her, “There is no death, only love. We are all one.”   But in L.A., a busboy she befriended forces her to violent action, and Richard is deployed to Iraq so bitter she fears he’ll get himself killed. Lonely, she sings to him at night, and her voice wins a job in a nightclub, and a small following.

After a reservation fire, she finds Bonnie living on the streets, and breaks probation to take her home to their beloved Sierras, but Bonnie dies in a tragic snowstorm.  After joining the Paiutes in the Cry Dance, Lorinda has had enough of her mother’s teachings. She becomes LaRinda, torrid, sexy, rap singer, protégé of a sophisticated Lebanese producer, and lands a USO performance in Baghdad, determined to find Richard. In that cauldron of violence, she is taken hostage.  She must use all her wits, gifts, and insights to save herself and the man she loves.  Will it be enough?

Reviewed by Jenny Luper, The US Review of Books

"She smells of alcohol and perfume. She leans over and gives me a kiss, somehow vague, as if it were blown to me."
Blending aspects of romance, new age, and chick lit, Cry Dance follows the journey of a young woman through love, loss, and a return to self. Lorinda has grown up with only the memory of her mother and the belief that there is no death. Though she tries to keep her faith in love, circumstances put her faith to the test. She is heartbroken when she finds her lover believes she has betrayed him, and a possible charge of murder pending against her doesn't help matters. Three name changes, burgeoning fame, and the loss of a loved one later, Lorinda decides on what shall be her true self and her true name.

This new take on a romance provides many surprises. In a story interspersed with tones of new age fiction and self-help books, an unexpectedly quick pace pushes through an action-filled plot. While not giving away any spoilers, the ending is satisfying in a unique way, taking care to avoid clichés. Bonner is also adept at bringing in the senses when creating a landscape for her characters. Whether a scene is set in a bedroom, the desert, or a run-down nightclub, the surroundings are shown by a clear sense of texture, sight, and sound. This technique provides a firm sense of setting, allowing the reader to more fully delve into the novel's themes of betrayal and redemption. Bonner's skill in peppering her novel with these sweet, yet melancholy details give a refreshing depth of tone to Cry Dance.
The US Review of Books

Cry Dance is a sweeping saga that catapults the reader from the sacred rituals of a Sierra Paiute tribe to the luxurious penthouse of a Hollywood drug lord, to beleaguered sands of Baghdad.  Mystical and mysterious, the story is full of surprises and insights.  Lorinda LeClair is a heroine you’ll never forget.  Cry Dance is a novel you won’t put down.
       - Antoinette May, author of  Pilot’s Wife and Sacred Well.

I just finished Cry Dance. What a great story-teller you are!  It had me on pins and needles from cover to cover.  I love the character of LaRinda and the flow of her several lives.  It's a sad, happy and exciting book. Thank you for writing it.
        - Judy Henderson, Bodega bay CA.

Like Louise Erdrich’s Beet Queen, Cry Dance brings into gentle and sometimes humorous focus the challenges of  reservation Indians in the white world.  Like Ann Patchet’s Bel Canto, Cry Dance portrays the power of music to transform.  Like Alice Sebold’s The Lovely Bones, Cry Dance portrays the redeeming power of love.