4.5
Wow this book is Excellent!
I really loved Daunis. Her intelligence and deep love of family, community (even when they're messy) is truly admirable. She knows what she likes (botany, hockey, her friends etc.) and yet she doesn't always know who she is. What I loved most was how her experience as a biracial woman was beautifully woven in throughout. It pulled in her different directions until she claimed her balance!
The supporting characters were all incredibly written! They all had another side to them which is what makes this the best kind of thriller/mystery.
This book is incredibly detailed! Boulley really gave us an intricate look to this story. From the science lingo to the traditions and Anishinabemowin woven throughout, all of it connects this story to countless roots and histories.
I would say this book is more of a tame thrill, but I loved the mystery! Getting to investigate with Daunis as she picks up clues and deciphers them, gets led on and then reaches a dead end was so intriguing! I was kept glued to the pages. At one point, I was very, very nervous! And that is exactly what I wanted! To be on the edge with Daunis and invested in finding the answers!
This story has A LOT to say. From dealing with the imperfection of family, to trying to heal a community, to finding your place in community, to the affects of addiction, the legacy of residential schools, microaggressions and racism. And it has much to say about violence against women and the lack of justice Indigenous women receive. These aren't just themes, but lived experiences that anchors this piece of fiction into reality.
The ending was...a hopeful one. It was what it needed to be. I'm not hear to spoil, but it is an ending that I think perfectly fit the story. The last passage absolutely nailed it!
My only critique is that sometimes I felt like the flow was off. We jump to different conclusions and I had to back track. But in the end, it didn't really matter. This book may be slow, but it's one you have to simmer in. You have to let it build up around you. You have to be invested to see the stakes, to feel them. And when you let this happen, it is "chef's kiss*!

Daunis Fontaine has always felt like an outsider. Sometimes she's "too Indian" for her mother's white relatives. As an unenrolled tribal member thanks to the scandal surrounding her parents' relationship and her own birth, Daunis never feels like she's fully part of life on the Ojibwe reservation no matter how much she time she spends with that side of her family.

With her pre-med college plans on hold after her grandmother's debilitating stroke, Daunis feels more adrift than ever. Enter Jamie the newest member of her half-brother Levi's hockey team. Jamie and Daunis click but that doesn't change all of the little things about his background that don't quite make sense.

In the wake of a tragedy that hits too close to home, Daunis learns the truth about Jamie and finds herself at the center of a far flung criminal investigation as a confidential informant. Delving deeper into the investigation, Daunis will have to confront uncomfortable truths about her own family's past and the reservation community to discover the truth. After years of admiring her elders, Daunis will have have to embrace being a strong Anishinaabe kwe (Ojibwe woman) herself to see things through in Firekeeper's Daughter (2021) by Angeline Boulley.

Firekeeper's Daughter is Boulley's debut novel.

Boulley describes this story as the indigenous Nancy Drew she always wanted to read and that really is the best description. With plot threads exploring opioid addiction (and dealing), grief, and sexual assault, Firekeeper's Daughter is a heavy read.

Subplots involving hockey, Daunis's complicated feelings about her family, and more can make the story seem sprawling at times although Boulley admirably ties every single thread together by the end.

Daunis's high stakes investigation and her intense relationship with Jamie plays out against the fully realized backdrop of life in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan and on the Ojibwe reservation. Daunis's focus on her own culture and heritage are crucial to the plot bringing Daunis closer to the real culprit complete with a focus on traditional (herbal) medicine and the importance of community elders.

Firekeeper's Daughter is a taught, perfectly plotted mystery with a protagonist readers won't soon forget. Highly recommended.

Possible Pairings: Every Stolen Breath by Kimberly Gabriel, Fake ID by Lamar Giles, The Bodies We Wear by Jeyn Roberts, Sadie by Courtney Summers, Veronica Mars

A captivating story that does an excellent job of weaving Native American traditions and society, with the America of today. It touches on underlying prejudices that continue under the surface, even as American society has supposedly evolved to be more inclusive. The main character Daunis is an amazing young women who honors her Native American heritage, while acknowledging her white privilege. She manages to be caring, while also being resourceful and resilient. Daunis draws upon her ancestors and elders to guide her through difficult times to try to save her community.

This is a story deep with Native American culture which made me feel like I was walking the path of someone else. I learned a lot from their traditions like how they make medicines to their survival skills. It was very fascinating to have that inside look how it all runs and flows with nature. Everything has a purpose and reason for its usefulness, nothing is taken for granted. The author handles sensitive subject matter very well and makes it easy to read without triggering more sensitive reads such as myself. I didn't have trouble like I have had with other stories were care was not taken. The main character is so complex and dealing with so much that it makes your heart break at times. But if you stick with it you will feel the journey was worth the pain.

Daunis Fontaine, an upcoming college freshman, is half-White (French and Italian) and half-Ojibwe and has struggled to be fully accepted by both sides of her family. A new recruit on her brother's elite hockey team, Jamie Johnson, understands what it means to be biracial and has further struggled with fitting in due to repeated moves. Daunis, who is coping with her uncle's sudden death, becomes close to Jamie, but soon has another tragedy strike close to home, after which her worldview changes entirely. I don't want to share too much, because I think Angeline Boulley has done a fantastic job layering and progressing the story.

That said, I want to highlight the several aspects of this book that I particularly enjoyed. Daunis is a very well-written and multi-faceted character. She is very mature for her age, and her strengths lie in her cultural roots. Likewise one of the strengths of this #OwnVoices book is Ms. Boulley's description of Ojibwe culture and traditions. Daunis is immersed in her community and is surrounded by strong Ojibwe women, including her aunt Teddie, her best friend Lilly's Grandma, and other Elders. These characters, too, are very well-developed and Ms. Boulley gives them each their own personality. No person is superfluous to the story.

I also liked how Ms. Boulley layered several stories on top of one another. There's the present story of the horrific incident which Daunis witnesses and the aftermath, but also the stories of Daunis's uncle, the hockey community, and Daunis's parents. It all ties together very beautifully.

That said, there were a few storylines that I think were unnecessary and the plot could have progressed without their inclusion. I also am not always the biggest fan of YA romance, and while Daunis and Jamie are fantastic characters you can't help but root for, I wasn't the biggest fan of all the romance (but that's just me!). These few minor details, however, are my only criticisms of the book.

Firekeeper's Daughter is one of the best YA books I've read in a while, and I strongly encourage everyone to pick this up.

Thank you to Netgalley, Henry Holt and Co., and Macmillan Children's Publishing Group for my free e-ARC. This review can also be found on my GoodReads page, and I will also be posting a review on my Instagram @myweekendsareliterary.

Firekeeper’s Daughter is an #OwnVoices debut novel by Angeline Boulley. It is a story about Daunis, a Native teen who is faced with rooting out the corruption in her community. Daunis is a biracial woman who was born out of a scandal that is widely known in her community. She plans to go away to college, but when her family is struck with tragedy, she decides to stick close to home to help. After Daunis witnesses a shocking murder, things start to unfold around her. This book is a thriller, but it also discusses many important topics and deals with a lot of triggering events.

Overall, this was a really great book. I loved the mystery, which kept me guessing throughout the book. I loved Daunis, and I loved getting to know her and witness her growth as a young Ojibwe woman. I felt so immersed in the story, and I grew so connected with the characters that I could actually picture how Daunis’s life had unfolded after the book ended. Even if you don’t like thrillers, there is so much more to this story than that. This is such a great and informative book, and I definitely recommend picking it up. I really look forward to seeing what Angeline Boulley writes next!

Firekeeper's Daughter by Angeline Boulley is reviewed in the April 2021 issue of Gumshoe Review and is exclusive to them until May 1st, 2021. You may read the review at this link <http://www.gumshoereview.com/php/Review-id.php?id=6744>.

3.5 ⭐

This YA mystery thriller is a breath of fresh air in the genre.

Does it do anything new? Other than exploring a rich, underrepresented community? No. There is still an unnecessary romantic subplot that distracts more than fulfills (but I’m in my deep 20s, so there’s that). Many of the clues were obvious and it was frustrating when they were introduced in the first act but not explored until much later in the book. And our protagonist makes rooky mistakes that a high schooler would.

However, I love that our character is on the older side: 18/19 instead of 15-17. That made her actions and the situations Daunis’ found herself in believable. Like our protagonist, I was deeply invested in her community. Her elders were sometimes obstacles, sources of grief/pain, saviors, beacons of hope, etc. They were multifaceted and flawed. Loved this and the multitude of lessons Daunis learns along the way.

Run, don't walk, to your nearest library or book store to grab a copy of The Firekeeper's Daughter. I could not put this book down. Taking place in Sault Ste. Marie, MI, the author draws from what she has experienced as a Native American.

The book centers around Daunis Fontaine, a teen who doesn't quite fit in anywhere and straddles two worlds; that of being born part Ojibwe and part white. When she witnesses a murder, and her finds out her community is immersed in meth-related deaths, Daunis goes undercover for the FBI. In the process, she also loses her heart.

If you find it unbelievable that a teen is going undercover, you have to meet Duanis first. She’s many things; tough, tender,smart, a loyal friend, someone you want on your side. Most of all, she wants to see her community survive and for her nieces to have a future that is not filled with destruction and tragedy. She thinks of others, before she thinks of herself.

There are a lot of characters within this story and they are well-developed, along with their backstory. They take nothing away from Daunis’ story, they only add to it. The book flows smoothly through Daunis’ life and the people surrounding her.

Not only is this book a thriller, but it’s a powerful exploration of the Native American culture, history, and language. Touted as a YA book, this is also definitely an adult read. Read it now!

Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher and the author for this E-ARC. All opinions are my own. This review can also be found on my Goodreads page.

This was a really solid YA mystery. I loved the main character and how we got a mix of her own story and family struggles with the overarching mystery. The writing was clear and easy to follow. I loved how she interweaved history of her culture within the narrative. This did have some typical YA tropes and a romance was a focus as well (which isn't always my favorite). Ultimately this was a strong read and I am so excited to see this turn into a show and to see what this author does next!!

Phenomenal YA mystery and amazing character in Daunis!! I loved the mystery and the characters. The information about the reservation families and the unfair practices against Native American people is so unfortunate and also true. I liked how Daunis was full of moxie and also a strong woman. I also think the family and their relationships made a vital part of the plot. Daunis is such an amazing heroine. She feels torn between her two parents & their legacies. I loved her determination. Family and traditions help Daunis stay true to herself. I loved the details about Ojibwa culture too. The suspenseful mystery made me want to know more about the plot. She has woven a wonderful story. I look forward to more. I think the author is a phenomenal talent and I can’t wait to read the next book. I hope she writes more about the family and her Ojibwa people. This book kept me up late every night reading!

4.5/5 Stars

18-year-old Daunis is of mixed heritage making her feel like an outsider on the Ojibwe reservation. She witnesses a murder and agrees to become an undercover informant for an FBI investigation looking into a group of drug-related deaths in her hometown.

I really liked this and found it to be such an addictive story. I went into it pretty blindly, other than knowing it was deeply entwined with Native culture and had something to do with meth... and I highly recommend that's all you know going in! I loved that it was set in Canada, as I rarely seem to read books set in my home country. I really loved learning more about First Nation traditions, language, and history in a very subtle way. I loved Daunis, she was such a complex and intriguing character to read about. I loved the exploration of addiction, abuse, sexual assault, and grief and how sensitively these topics were looked at. The mystery about who was behind the drug crimes had me so invested, and I was able to figure it out, but I still had so much fun reading this story. I wasn't the biggest fan of the romance, but I like where it ended up in the end.

Overall, I definitely recommend you check this book out!

Firekeepers' Daughter introduces Daunis Fontaine, an 18-year-old native American hockey player, who struggles to reconcile her Anishinaabe father's culture with her white mother's relatives' prejudice. Although she loves her tribal community, she is denied official citizenship in the Sault tribe due to her mixed parentage. Her plans to head off to college to pursue a medical degree are put on hold when her uncle overdoses on meth and her grandmother has a stroke. As meth related deaths continue to mount, Daunis is recruited by the FBI to work undercover to investigate a deadly new form of meth being distributed in the community. Using her knowledge of chemistry and traditional plants, she partners with Jamie, an agent posing as a hockey player new to her brother Levi's team, to source the drug and discover its dealers. The author, an enrolled member of the Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians, shares key teachings from her culture, including Ojibwe language and a look at the corruption that has led to the meth plague on reservations across the country. This compelling look at Native American culture woven into a complex criminal investigation is not to be missed!

So I have lots of reasons to really like this book. For one, there is a strong female lead character in Daunis. While she is mixed race Indian and white it is very clear that she is very in tune to her Indian heritage and she fully embraces the teachings of her native culture. I have long been fascinated by Indian culture and it doesn’t come up often in published fiction. Daunis is also extremely fierce, as one of the few girls who plays on the boys hockey team, and she is just as good if not better than many of them. This story strikes at the heart of real world issues, with a no potent version of hallucinogenic laced meth making its way around the small Michigan peninsula of Sault Ste Marie. With it’s influence now bleeding into other communities, the FBI has taken an interest, and Daunis is asked to step forward as an informant. The with no clear leads on where the tainted meth is coming from, what secrets will turn up in the investigation, and how many personal risks is Daunis undertaking? A bold, fresh debut. Review posted to Amazon, Litsy, Goodreads, Facebook.

Amazing YA novel that is so refreshing! A thriller that is much more than just that. The author drops you in the middle of the Ojibwe reservation and Daunis' hometown and encourages you to learn more about the culture! It makes the side character, by proxy, have more depth and feel fleshed out, while at the same time directly developing on the intricacies of Daunis' family life.

Teenaged Daunis Fontaine has never fit into her hometown or the Ojibwe reservation. She must stay home from college to care for her ailing mother, which puts on hold her hopes for her future.

When she meets Jamie, a handsome young man on her brother's hockey team, he seems like a much-needed bright spot in her life--but Daunis is sure that he's hiding something. And when she witnesses a shocking murder, Daunis finds herself in the middle of an FBI investigation of a drug ring.

With her knowledge of traditional Ojibwe medicine and her brave willingness to go undercover, Daunis unearths dark secrets that could tear apart her community.

Boulley explores Daunis's complex feelings of loyalty and duty to her community—but her potential betrayal of (and by) individuals within it.

I was distracted by some jumpy transitions between action, thought, and feeling, especially in the earlier sections of the book, but Boulley weaves fantastically fluid and frequent details of indigenous tradition into Daunis's everyday life, pivotal moments, and her personal and cultural history.

Daunis is a wonderfully self-possessed teenage girl character I loved following through her story.

I received a prepublication version of this book courtesy of Henry Holt and Company and NetGalley.

This is one of those YA thrillers that I will likely come back to several times over the years. In fact, I might have to start teaching it! It combines thriller tropes with the romance elements that YA novels are known for, but is also an own-voices novel from the author's own Native American upbringing. The characters are complex and they behave like real people, not just like a middle-aged writer's idea of how teenagers talk and act. There is also one extremely minor-seeming plot line that I originally thought was an unnecessary addition, but ends up coming back in a huge way! (I also almost threw the book across the room in anger at one point, but since I was reading it on my phone, I decided against that at the last second.)

Wow. This book. Just incredible.

It is so interesting to see a lot of the more "mundane" aspects in this book. You really learn about Native culture, as you go along, without ever feeling like all this information is being shoved in your face.. So, that perspective was just super cool (and a bit disheartening when it came to a few things).

Overall, this was such an immersive read with a plot that keeps you turning pages. It was hard for me to ever put this one down. It was a little odd to see the main character Daunis get wrapped up in this mystery and become an informant for the FBI, but it was also thrilling.

I rounded this book up to 5 stars from 4.5 because I just enjoyed reading this so dang much. But there were a couple things that I wasn't quite as sold on as I would have liked.

One is that there is just SO much going on in this book. It's quite long (just under 500 pages) and includes a LOT of subplots that mostly all support the main plot. They can, however, drag you down a bit. It's easy to get a bit lost in all of the characters and everything going on. I honestly think another round of edits centered around trimming down the subplots would have really helped laser in the focus on what was really going on.

Another thing is the romance. It was a little strange to me. Most of the time I was on board the ship, but there were a few aspects that just didn't help float it for me. I won't spoil anything about it, but I was pretty good with their back and forth feelings until one part later in the story (after the fundraiser hockey game). Though the end was a little disappointing, it was probably the best route to take with the characters.

The last thing was the handling of a sexual assault. I understand why it ended up the way it did (the author made an excellent point in that regard), but right after the assault, something just felt off about how the topic was handled and how the characters handled it. Maybe it was just the fact that it felt like the author was making a statement about sexual assaults in the native communities, rather than making it an important aspect of the plot.

I know that three pretty major things that put a damper on my experience, but I still had to round this book up to five stars for my sheer enjoyment of this book. Highly recommend.

It’s hard to put a review into words for a book you just finished that took you down a river rapids of experiences and emotions.

The analytical part of my brain knows that Daunis felt very authentic and real; all characters were well developed and most held complexities. There was always a perfect amount of detail to keep the reader in the loop on the culture, the plants, etc. as a mystery, the story kept me guessing but gave enough small sprinkled clues that mystery readers could start to formulate theories and suspects.

It’s hard to put my subjective emotions into words upon finishing. I feel privileged and humbled to learn more about the Ojibwe traditions and language. I feel devastated by the amount tragedies Daunis and too many Native American women have faced.

fantastic. wonderfully written. well developed characters. I can't wait to booktalk this book to students.