A fictionalized account, as seen through the eyes of a woman known as Whirlwind, of life with the Oglala Sioux from 1820 through the aftermath of the victory at the Little Bighorn in 1877.

This sequel to Dorothy M. Johnson's prize-winning Buffalo Woman continues the story of Grandmother Whirlwind’s family of Hunkpapa and Oglala Sioux who flee to Canada with Sitting Bull after the Battle of the Little Bighorn. All the Buffalo Returning is a haunting novel about the fate of the Lakotas who find no surcease in Canada but are driven back onto their dwindling reservation by starvation. They face the enormous problem of surviving in the world of the white conquerors. Stormy, the grandson of Whirlwind, travels with his family to Pine Ridge for Wovoka's Ghost Dance. There, true believers who perform the sacred dance will experience the return of the lost buffalo and pony herds as well as the spirits of the beloved dead.