My workplace has a book club that continues to be active even while working from home most days. This is a thank you note, and a book review for one of the books we read, The Marrow Thieves by Cherie Dimaline.

Hi Coworkers,

I’m so happy that our book club is still going strong despite the current changes of having to work from home.

Also I’m sorry that I first slacked off with one of the books, this one, we were supposed to read for the book club. I’m super cheap and refused to buy any books, so I was waiting to get the e-book access from our local library and I was on hold. I’m so relieved that the book club meeting was pushed back by a few weeks. As things have aligned in my favor then. I got the book, and managed to read it just in time for the rescheduled book club meeting.

This is great book! I learned from our recent book club selections that I get emotionally intense when reading fiction books, and I have to stop reading them before bedtime. Because this is just as riveting and compelling for me.

My limited exposure to media and fiction work that has a post-apocalyptic setting, made me captivated when reading this book. It feels like the settings can be something that can happen in the foreseeable future. There are no fancy techno gadgets described in an elaborate manner, no comprehensive explanation on how the bone marrow extracted from indigenous people gets transformed into medication that enables the rest of the population to dream again, but as you read the chapters, you can feel deeply how this alleged ‘miracle cure’ has disrupted the lives of a particular group of people, and a fierce fight for survival has emerged.

In this case, one’s heritage and identity is double edged sword of something that one can be proud of, and something that you are hunted for. The precious commodity gave me an impression of analogies that can be associated similarly to elephants killed for their ivory tusks, or rhinoceroses hunted for their horns.

The hands on, gritty, on the ground, grueling experiences of survival is evident in every character, not just with Frenchie, the protagonist of the story. The reader can witness the elaborate coping mechanisms to keep a sliver of home, hope and sanity, weaving a fragmented sense of family from people you meet out of circumstance. For Frenchie, after shifting his mindset of letting go of his blood family and forming bonds with his ragtag family, it gets shaken up when one of the rarest of miracles happen, which is getting reconnected to a love one from when times were better. Frenchie getting reconnected with his father, caused friction as he felt conflicted about staying while pursuing his relationship with Rose. While Migwaans also was reconnected with his husband, since it was the last scene of the story, there wasn’t any elaboration on how this changed their lives moving forward.

I understand the reluctance of the older members of the group, when the youngest child RiRi insisted to know “Story”, the raw and horrific detail of what led them to the current situation they are in. Part of this narration os the real account of how the lands of North America were occupied by European colonizers, the impacts of the residential school system and its parallels to what is happening to the characters. Part of this narration is the environmental devastation that mankind has inflicted on the earth, a heavy hint of what our future can be in the forseeable future.

The elder Minerva is a key component to the story, a precious link to knowledge about their heritage and language. Frenchie first thought that for the girls in the group having to spend time with her is a drag because of Minerva’s quirkiness. But his opinion changed quickly after he discovered she is teaching the girls some of the words she knew. The symbolism portrayed from when she was captured and how she destroyed the medical apparatuses placed on her and the school that imprisoned her. Her death was devastating to the characters because of many things that she represents.

As someone who is a migrant to this country, my journey of learning about indigenous culture of the past and present, and this country’s history lasting impact on Indigenous peoples, is a work in progress I have to cultivate over the years. It wasn’t too long ago that through mainstream media, I’ve seen a two-spirit gay couple for the first time. So when I realized that Miggwans is in a similar relationship, I admit I was rooting for them more passionately, since there’s so few of them that I am aware of. To say I was jumping in joy at the last few paragraphs of the story, when he found his husband Isaac, is an understatement.

I’m gonna say it, our book club is really cool. Thanks for enriching my reading list, and I look forward to future books that we enjoy and talk about as a group.