The Marrow Thieves

I think this is a good book overall, but it's one I had a lot of trouble connecting with. I think if the main character was anyone other than Frenchie, this might have been easier for me to enjoy, but the fact is that I just don't like most teenagers, and first person POV from a teenager is always going to be a hard sell for me. I do really like reading Indigenous sci-fi, and the weaving and veneration of different Indigenous cultures throughout this book is a breath of fresh air, but yeah I just couldn't quite get into it. I think part of this is the narrow focus on Frenchie. The set-up where Indigenous people are being hunted because they hold the key to a society that has forgotten to dream feels more like a metaphor than a set-up. It's not hard to believe that western cultures will commit genocide for their own benefits, but God I hope we aren't so far gone as to murder children because we can't dream any more. Never seeing the world outside the Frenchie's found family means it was hard to understand what had actually happened to society. I feel like most of western crimes against POC's have been based in a hyperbolic need to protect something. We need to murder people, so we can dream again? The book never goes into what the consequences of not dreaming are, so I can't see why such horrors would be committed. I can assume there's some amount of propaganda involved, and admittedly I am judging this whilst sitting on my throne of white privilege, but yeah, it feels like a literary device in what's otherwise a very commercial read. Again, if Miig or Isaac or Minerva were the main character, someone who saw a little more of the world and had more rounded perspective, this all might have worked better for me, but my end review is more, “good book, but not for me.”