{"id":139149757,"date":"2023-11-25T14:28:06","date_gmt":"2023-11-25T14:28:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/writetosuccess.net\/book-review-the-marrow-thieves\/"},"modified":"2023-11-25T14:28:06","modified_gmt":"2023-11-25T14:28:06","slug":"book-review-the-marrow-thieves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/writetosuccess.net\/nl\/book-review-the-marrow-thieves\/","title":{"rendered":"Book Review: The Marrow Thieves"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cherie Dimaline (2017)<\/h2>
<\/picture><\/div>

Dystopian novel, YA fiction, Indigenous culture, M\u00e9tis author, climate catastrophe, environment, Canadian author, queer fiction<\/p>

\"green<\/figure>

When I began a stint teaching middle school full time, I decided it was probably time to start reading young adult (YA) fiction.<\/p>

As a category, it mostly passed me by in my younger years \u2013 Nancy Drew<\/a><\/em> fascination excepted. It had been a long time since I\u2019d had a reason to read books written for teens, but it seemed only fair to see what was on offer.<\/p>

Surprising appeal<\/h2>

Almost to a person, my students LOVED sci-fi. They gobbled it up, swapped their favorite tomes and bonded hard with teachers who shared their tastes for lumbering series of improbable scenarios.<\/p>

This was quietly filed under my \u2018things I respect but will never, never understand\u2019 hoarding.<\/p>

So it was with some trepidation I picked up The Marrow Thieves<\/em>. Dystopian fiction isn\u2019t exactly sci-fi, but tends to share the original sin of being fueled by ideology, not character. But \u2013 Dimaline\u2019s book has collected more awards than Michael Phelps so…<\/p>

The big idea<\/h2>

The Marrow Thieves <\/em>takes place in Canada, not long from now. Environmental calamity and the ensuing social trauma have robbed all except Indigenous peoples of their ability to dream. Government \u201crecruiters\u201d hunt and kidnap the remaining dreamers to suck the visions out of their bones.<\/p>

Dimaline introduces herself on her website<\/a>, writing:<\/p>

I am a registered and claimed member of the Metis Nation of Ontario (www.metisnation.org<\/a>), the federally and provincially recognized representative government for our community. Specifically, I am from the Historic Georgian Bay M\u00e9tis Community with section 35 Indigenous rights\u2026.<\/p>

I come from hunters and women who told stories and made their own remedies when they weren\u2019t purchasing salves from the \u2018peddler\u2019 who would come across the Bay once in a while. Some remedies used holy water from the Shrine in town, others used water collected from the Bay on Easter Sunday. Many were based around onions and pine. To this day, my family hunts and harvests.<\/p><\/blockquote>

She notes, \u201cI\u2019ve spent my entire working life, with a few small detours, working in and for the Indigenous community\u2026 But all I ever wanted to be was a writer.\u201d<\/p>

Her callings combine in The Marrow Thieves<\/em>. It is a tense, gritty, powerful tale cram-jammed with vivid characters including the protagonist Frenchie, whose brother\u2019s kidnapping opens the story.<\/p>

It also shines a hard, unsparing light on the historic trauma suffered by Indigenous peoples in what is now Canada \u2013 including the residential schools designed to rend children from the fabric of family and culture.<\/p>

Stakes are high from the first page, which generates real tension. Yet they aren\u2019t cheap thrills; the action matters because the characters matter.<\/p>

Impressively, the novel <\/em>succeeds in being educational without being didactic, and tackles big ideas without pamphleteering.<\/p>

From a teaching standpoint, it is a curriculum designer\u2019s dream. <\/p><\/div>

Want to talk about history? Colonialism? Environmentalism? Sexuality? Community? Cultural identity? Language? Family?<\/p>

You can do it all with The Marrow Thieves<\/em>, and more.<\/p>

My take<\/h2>

Grim but compulsive take on an all-too-plausible near future. The Marrow Thieves<\/em> soars where so much dystopian futurism sags: characterization.<\/p>

Their take<\/h2>

\u201cThough the novel tackles some heavy subject matter, The Marrow Thieves <\/em>feels lighter as a result of Dimaline\u2019s graceful, almost fragile, prose. \u201cThe skeletons of the green trees curved under the elegant weight of the snow, bowing and twisting like ribbons in the wind,\u201d she writes, providing a beautiful undercurrent to a world that seems to have been damaged beyond repair.\u201d \u2013 Jessica Rose, Quill & Quire<\/a>, May 2017<\/p>

Must read for<\/h2>

Teen fans of dystopian fiction\/sci-fi\/futurism; adults who love a good (and troubling) imaginative tale<\/p>

Read also<\/h2>

  • Hunting by Stars <\/em>by Cherie Dimaline<\/p><\/li>

  • The Word for World is Forest<\/em> by Ursula K. LeGuin<\/p><\/li>

  • Tomorrow When the War Began <\/em>by John Marsden<\/p><\/li><\/ul>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Cherie Dimaline (2017)<\/p>","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-139149757","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nBook Review: The Marrow Thieves - Write To Success<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/writetosuccess.net\/nl\/book-review-the-marrow-thieves\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"nl_NL\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Book Review: The Marrow Thieves - 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