The premise of this book was really intriguing, but unfortunately that’s pretty much all the positivity I have to say about it. 

First of all, the general worldbuilding/big picture of the story left a LOT to be desired. The premise of bone marrow being used to allow people to dream again is a really interesting one, but it wasn’t fleshed out anywhere near enough to add anything to the novel. Add to that that we never really see how the non-indigenous people live and how the bone marrow was actually being used, meant we had no context for the central idea of the story. For example, surely after so many years of harvesting, everyone would either be fixed by it, or dead if they didn’t already have access to it? The weakness of this actually detracted from the plot, and in my opinion this book would have been a lot stronger without it. If it was a general dystopian about a group of indigenous people trying to survive a catastrophic climate event, all of the same elements could have been explored, and probably in a more impactful way. 

Additionally, the very size of Canada made no sense. They were travelling for over 5 YEARS in Canada, but never seemed to make it ‘North’ or reach any ocean. Canada is not that big. But in the same breath, two of the group by chance came upon long lost family members within the space of a couple of weeks? Make it make sense! 

There was also a strong theme of misogyny throughout the book, which is odd coming from a female author. For example, the guys were also looking out for ‘the girls’ more than the other guys, for no apparent reason other than they were women. Or only the men having guns and doing scouting, hunting etc. At some point it was said that they take it in turns, but that was never actually shown in the book. Some of this may be true to the tradition of Native Americans, but I still didn’t like it. 

Of the four women in the group, one dies, one is essentially crazy and gets captured, one is nothing more than an object of sexual desire for the male main character, and one is severely mentally traumatised (which is her only character trait). Whereas all the GUYS are pretty normal (notwithstanding their lives before the group), and nothing as momentous/disturbing ever happens to them (apart from the mc). Some of this may be down to Dimaline’s apparent inability to flesh characters out, but it still made me uncomfortable. 

Adding to that, of course the two girls of eligible age in the group get paired up with others guys from the group, as if platonic relationships essentially can never exist. Since when does every woman have to have a (male) partner to be valid? Let alone the last tragedy of the book being a woman dying (during a pretty predictable ending). Or, let’s not forget, Francis’ mother being ‘mentally unstable’, but every father figure he comes into contact with is seemingly perfect. 

Finally, we come to Francis. I didn’t mind his character throughout the majority of the book, he was a kid working his way through a difficult situation. But my GOD, he turned into an utter dick in the last 30-ish%. He was a GROWN MAN by this point, and that’s when he’s at his worst. He starts pratting around to impress people, his rivalry with Derrick is ridiculous, he’s INSANELY insecure and jealous over Rose, and calls a woman a ‘female’. And then to add insult to injury right at the end of the book, Rose just forgives Francis’ dicky behaviour because someone died? His dicky behaviour, which he calls an ‘argument’, when in fact it was just him being an incel freak. 

Oh, and to top it off, the very end was entirely baffling. Dimaline seemed to be suggesting that not a single one of them had ever seen someone that wasn’t fully Native American. Someone who was half native, half Caucasian seemed like a total mystery to them. 

What a weird weird book.