Louise Erdrich's novel, The Plague of Doves, is set in an Ojibwe reservation in North Dakota and the neighboring border town of Pluto. Both the town and reservation are fictional. The main plot concerns the relationship between the members of the Native America Ojibwe tribe living on the reservation and their white neighbors. The ethnicities of the characters have major effects on their lives, both in terms of their acceptance by local communities and their economic opportunities.

Judge Antone Bazil Coutts is of mixed blood, part white and part Ojibwe, a mixed heritage that helps him navigate the complex hybridity of tribal law. 

Corwin Peace is the son of John Wildstrand and Maggie Peace, and thus also of mixed blood, with his father being white and his mother Native American.

Marn Wolde is white, descended from a German-American family.

Uncle Warren Wolde is also white, of German-American descent, and the murderer of the farm family, a murder for which the Native Americans are blamed.

Dr. Cordelia Lochren is also white, the baby who survived the murder of her family by Uncle Warren. Because she believed that the Ojibwe condemned for the murder were guilty, until she discovers the truth of the murder, she displays some prejudice against members of the tribe.