Author: Tanya Talaga

It’s really hard to pick-up a book like this one and not feel ashamed. Originally given to me as part of a professional development series, I put off reading it until closer to our meeting date where the group of us would discuss the themes present.

My thought process was with the overwhelming number of items on the go and books I’m reading, I’d like the content to be fresh.

I could’ve read this years ago and the content would still be fresh in my mind.

Thunder Bay has been in the (Canadian) national media for the tragic end to seven of its teenage Indigenous students. As with all news cycles, people take an interest and then move on to something else. Talaga strung together a series of stories that just cannot be ignored.

It starts with Channie Wenjack, who froze to death in the 1960s running away from residential school (a horrendous part of our history, which was nothing more than cultural genocide) and looks at the human rights violations that are still happening with our Indigenous population. Seven deaths from young people who were forced to leave home and travel hundreds of kilometers to a city that was/is violent and racist towards them.

While it may sound like this book is centered around guilt and blame, it’s really a wake-up call for the entire country.

Canada’s dark history towards its Indigenous peoples isn’t something that happened, it’s still happening. We lament the tragedies happening in other parts of the world, but fail to recognize the serious tragedy happening in our own.

In 2008, the government formally apologized for residential schools and as a result, a truth and reconciliation commission was formed. Its aim is to reveal the past wrongdoing and find ways to resolve the issues going forward. The commission gave its final recommendation in 2015.

Yet, the conditions upon which these seven fallen feathers lost their lives still exist today as they did when they died.

This book makes you think and it does that by waking you up.