Kidnapping, Murder, Death, Recollections of Rape, Blood, Appropriation and Colonialism

#ownvoices Anishinaabe, Anxiety rep

Hello friends. I’m back with another review because I finally finished Warrior Girl Unearthed and I have a lot of thoughts about it. I’m hoping that I can write a follow up to my original post about cultural identity from when I read Firekeeper’s Daughter, but I don’t think I’ll be able to do that today. So let me just try to get my thoughts out on this before I end up forgetting.

First, I need to say that Perry is NOT Daunis, and that’s okay with me. I didn’t expect her to be just like her aunt, and I think it worked out better for this book because so many years have passed since the events of the first book that there’s no way that Perry would do the same things that her aunt did. I will say that now that Perry is sixteen and old enough to know more things, I needed her to make her own mistakes and go through this journey that she did. I don’t know who had it worse, but both Perry and Daunis went through some terrible things within their respective books that there’s no way that there won’t be some residual effects from such things.

I think Perry is more reckless in her fight to reclaim her ancestors, and it works in her favor. She learns that all actions have consequences though, and while she may be willing to suffer through them, she needs to think about who else they will affect, and figure out whether she wants the people she loves and cares about to suffer with her. That’s the first thing I took away from this, and I feel like she really learns about herself and what she needs to do by the time the book is over.

I really liked that each chapter starts with quotes from real people in regards to the desecration of Anishinaabe ancestors and their burial grounds, their bones, their culture, and how this is not okay. There’s still clear commentary about the issue of Missing Indigenous Women and Girls and that plays into the book as well. What was happening back in Daunis’s book hasn’t stopped, and it’s important to know that in real life, this also hasn’t stopped. I think there was a part in the book where they even revised the issue name to include two-spirit people that are also being kidnapped and killed, and that was important to note as well.

Perry is much more in touch with her Anishinaabe culture than Daunis was – well maybe I shouldn’t say that because Daunis was in touch with her culture as much as she could be – and while Daunis was part white, Perry is part Black, and Boulley doesn’t shy away from anti-Black culture that Perry and Pauline face every single day. I would say Perry faces it more than Pauline because Perry is very unapologetic for who she is and how she really doesn’t give a eff about what people think about her. Pauline is more of the “good girl” compared to Perry, but that doesn’t mean that Perry isn’t good. Just something to think about when you get to a certain part of the book where Perry is reminiscing about a conversation she overheard of two teachers in like elementary school about her and her sister. By the way, eff that teacher that said what she said about Perry, is all I have to say about that.

Honestly I wish I was as brave as Perry, and I think the journey that she took throughout this book, about herself and what she is capable of, was such an amazing thing to see. I don’t know if Boulley will write more books in this world but I really hope she does. Showing just how much the past can both positively and negatively impact the people of today was needed. Seeing how academics can truly mess up tribes’ claim to their ancestors and prolong the process just because was freaking upsetting to see. Seeing how laws that were made to “help” tribes having loopholes that doesn’t protect everyone pissed me off too. This was another powerful book by Boulley and I hope everyone gets a chance to read it.

• Pages of Starlight
• Cracker Crumb Life
• So like YA know
• Past Midnight
• Quirky Cat’s Fat Stacks
• Carla Loves to Read
• She Can’t Stop Reading

I don’t know if I did this book justice for this review. But if I think of anything else I want to say about it, it will probably go in my continuation of my discussion post. I’m not sure yet. I know that I really enjoyed this book though and I’m happy to say that Boulley is an auto-read author for me. Hopefully auto-buy once I get settled.