Circle of Wonder: A Native American Christmas Story Book

"Circle of Wonder centers upon a world that is so dear to me as to be engraved on my memory forever. I was a boy of twelve when my parents and I moved to Jemez Pueblo, New Mexico in 1946. . . . It was a place of singular beauty and wonder and delight. My first Christmas there was beyond my imagining. . . . The night sky was radiant; the silence was vast and serene. In all the years of my life I have not gone farther into the universe. I have not known better the essence of peace and the sense of eternity. I have come no closer to the understanding of the most holy."—N. Scott Momaday

A mute Indian child has an extraordinary experience one Christmas when, following a figure who seems to be his beloved dead grandfather, he becomes part of a circle in which he, animals, nature, and all the world join in a moment of peace and good will.