Cos' I Said So...
By Jocelyn Cosgrove
By Jocelyn Cosgrove
Walking around a Barnes and Noble store is more dangerous than it seems, especially for a reader such as myself. Even if I set out to buy one or two books, I could spend an hour walking through the Young Adult section, looking for new books to add to my ever growing book list.
That's how I stumbled upon “The Marrow Thieves” by Cherie Dimaline, a dystopian novel about Indigenous people being hunted for the dreams in their bone marrow because the rest of the world has forgotten how to dream. The story follows a boy named Frenchie and his companions as they struggle to survive and make their way to the northern old lands.
I was extremely happy when I first saw this book. For the first time since the day I really began to love reading, this was the first time where I have found a book about, and written by, members of Indigenous communities. As a Yupik person myself, I felt this sense of pride, excitement and recognition knowing that this wasn’t going to be another YA book featuring white female heroes.
I have yet to finish “The Marrow Thieves,” which I completely blame on homework and basketball, but from what I’ve read so far, it is all I could have hoped for and more. There is Indigenous history, going back to before the colonists came to the Americas, throughout the whole book. Not only that, but history seems to be repeating itself in this book in a way. In the book, Indigenous people are being hunted by Recruiters, which are the hunters, for their bone marrow. If found by the Recruiters, the Indigenous people are taken to schools, much like the old residential schools. Families are split up because they have died, been left behind or caught by the Recruiters. History is told by the winners who change the story, however “The Marrow Thieves” tells the history of what the Indigenous people have gone through through their eyes. It rarely happens, but when it does in a piece of writing, art or a story paced down for generations, the voice of the people telling those stories are stronger. Their heritage and history is stronger. This book is making Indigenous history, tribes and heritages so much stronger by telling their story through this book and I’m excited to see what journey it will take me on.
That's how I stumbled upon “The Marrow Thieves” by Cherie Dimaline, a dystopian novel about Indigenous people being hunted for the dreams in their bone marrow because the rest of the world has forgotten how to dream. The story follows a boy named Frenchie and his companions as they struggle to survive and make their way to the northern old lands.
I was extremely happy when I first saw this book. For the first time since the day I really began to love reading, this was the first time where I have found a book about, and written by, members of Indigenous communities. As a Yupik person myself, I felt this sense of pride, excitement and recognition knowing that this wasn’t going to be another YA book featuring white female heroes.
I have yet to finish “The Marrow Thieves,” which I completely blame on homework and basketball, but from what I’ve read so far, it is all I could have hoped for and more. There is Indigenous history, going back to before the colonists came to the Americas, throughout the whole book. Not only that, but history seems to be repeating itself in this book in a way. In the book, Indigenous people are being hunted by Recruiters, which are the hunters, for their bone marrow. If found by the Recruiters, the Indigenous people are taken to schools, much like the old residential schools. Families are split up because they have died, been left behind or caught by the Recruiters. History is told by the winners who change the story, however “The Marrow Thieves” tells the history of what the Indigenous people have gone through through their eyes. It rarely happens, but when it does in a piece of writing, art or a story paced down for generations, the voice of the people telling those stories are stronger. Their heritage and history is stronger. This book is making Indigenous history, tribes and heritages so much stronger by telling their story through this book and I’m excited to see what journey it will take me on.