Reviews with content warning for Drug abuse - Firekeeper's Daughter

This book has me feeling conflicted. I normally hate books that do not pass the Aila test, but I couldn't hate Firekeeper's Daughter. There were several times I became very frustrated with this book because of the number of Native women who died and were assaulted, but for once it didn't feel like it was done for sh*ts and giggles. It did however slowdown my reading pace as I can only take so much of that at a time.

Would recommend that you read this at some point as well.

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rain_baby's review against another edition

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4.0

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taylorpg's review against another edition

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challenging hopeful informative mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.25

The Firekeeper’s Daughter is a beautiful story, exemplifying the importance of Indigenous authors and stories in the world of literature and publishing. This book has perfectly balanced the difficulty of shedding light on important issues while simultaneously writing a story that keeps the audience on the edge of their seats for its entirety.

Our main character Daunis Fontaine is an Anishinaabe kwe (Ojibwe woman) looking forward to starting school at the local community college with her best friend, when one day everything changes. After the deaths of multiple people in her life, Daunis is contracted by the FBI as a secret informant to help stop the meth problem reeking havoc on her community, however, along the way she will uncover secrets she never wanted to learn and face the harsh reality about the people she holds dear in her community.

Angeline Boulley has seamlessly incorporated issues indigenous communities face everyday such as violence against women, complicated tribal and U.S. government relations, generational trauma, etc., while ultimately highlighting and focusing on Daunis’ core values of community, language, indigenous heritage, etc. Boulley frames these issues in such a way that they are not the focus of the story but merely factors that affect the character’s lives. The Firekeeper’s Daughter is a book where you can truly see the authors passion and commitment on every page, in every word. I highly recommend the audiobook production with narrator Isabella Star Leblanc. The story was beautifully told and the narration helped me better understand the Ojibwe words that I could not pronounce. Leblanc helped bring the story to life in ways that I personally could never do.

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