This was an incredibly challenging read. Kit Crockett is tied up in what is perceived by her community as a crime, but is actually an attempt to rid of her nonwhite friend. Her mother has died, and her father stays in jail until he's given a trial. Thus, Kit becomes a ward of the state, and her well-being is put in the hands of adults who think they know best. They don't. Kit is sent to an Indian Industrial School rather than getting a chance to live with her loving, willing relatives.

The abuse that happens at the school is incredibly graphic. CW: child sexual abuse.

Engaging and immersive. A recommended purchase for collections where crime and thrillers are popular.

Stealing is a well-told story about Kit, a Cherokee child, who is taken from her home after her mother dies from TB and her father is incarcerated. Set in North Carolina in the 1950s, Kit's relatives try to get the courts to grant permission for them to adopt her, but a well-meaning pastor decides it is best for Kit to be sent away to a Christian boarding school where she and other Native American girls are sexually abused by the headmaster. Kit is strong-willed and honest with a good sense of right and wrong. Stealing is highly recommended for discussion groups who enjoy coming-of-age stories.

Masterful. Moving and vivid.
Many thanks to Mariner Books and to Netgalley for providing me with a galley in exchange for my honest opinion.

8/10

This book is completely written from the perspective of Kit, a 9 year old Cherokee girl growing up in the 1950s.

Kit is living in a home for children of the state, but the book bounces back and forth between the story that led her to being put in the home, and the actual life she is experiencing inside the home.

The writing is wonderful. Oftentimes when a book is written from a child’s perspective, it can’t hold up for the night of the novel. Or at times it’s hoakey. This book is none of those.

The writing is intelligent and compelling. And even though it is from the mind of a 9 year old, it is very much for adult readers. Incidents are described with the naïveté of a child, but it doesn’t make the incidents any less impactful.

All on all, this is a wonderful journey from an amazing author.

#netgalley #stealing

Absolutely loved this book. From the tone to the wonderful descriptions, this book is an excellent read.

Margaret Verble never disappoints. This is a well written book; telling a difficult story to hear and comprehend. Young American Indian children were taken from their homes under the auspices of the US Government and enabled by Christian religious organizations in the pursuit towards assimilating them into the US population by removing all traces of their culture, language, family, and spiritual ways. It's a sad and shameful chapter in our nation's history and one we should not forget.

I recommend this to any and everyone.

This was a heartbreaking story about a Cherokee girl separated from her family and sent to a boarding school. Though the narrator is a child, this novel is for adults. The narrative is compelling and heartbreaking; highly recommended.

This was an interesting story. Kit weaves together describing her life as a Cherokee girl forcibly removed from her family and sent to a boarding school and relating the events that led to her removal. Verble has written Kit’s voice very authentically and you can’t help but like her and root for her. The story of what happened to Native American children in boarding schools is not a story often told so I was glad to learn more. One thing that stood out to me was how, even though the decision to remove Kit was ultimately wrong, many of those making the decision aren’t portrayed as caricatures of evil. Prejudiced and misapplying their religious and moral beliefs, yes, but not cackling maniacs intent on destroying families and children. A few were cackling maniacs and horrifying for sure but if everyone had been portrayed that way, it wouldn’t have felt authentic. The ending wrapped up a little more abruptly than I wanted and I wish we could have been privy to the results of Kit’s brave actions. However, this isn’t enough of an issue for me not to highly recommend Stealing for historical fiction fans.

This was a good book. Written in first person narrative. Kit a nine year old girl, Native American and Caucasian, gets taken away from her family and placed in a in a residential boarding school. In STEALING Kit tells her sad and awful story.

Stealing wasn’t the book I was expecting, but I still found it to be a powerful read. However, I must note that the first half of the book moved very slowly before turning into a heart-pounding second half. Additionally, I actually enjoyed the flashbacks more than than the present day story, and I thought the religious commentary was quite profound. I also found Kit to be a strong child narrator who stirred a variety of emotions within the reader. Finally, the ending left me on the edge of my seat and not in a good way. Yet, aside from multiple trigger warnings, I believe Stealing is they type of book that many readers could connect to on some level.

This book was wonderful. Heartbreaking, full of life and wonder. The writer has brilliant prose and told this with depth. I truly look forward to more.

BookBrowse members reviewed Stealing for our early reader program, First Impressions, rating it an extremely high 4.8-star average. Link to reviews:

Verble’s newest novel recounts the story of Kit, a young Cherokee girl taken from her family in the 1950s and forced into a Christian residential school. As you might guess from the premise, this is a difficult book to read, made at times both lighter and more brutal because it’s narrated through Kit’s blunt child’s perspective. I loved Kit’s voice—tender, bright, earnest, forceful, and broken—and the sheer force of her childhood convictions. What Kit experiences at the school is nightmarish, and I appreciated Verble’s honesty and the way she makes her readers look history in the eye. The writing is great: it feels true enough to the voice of a young girl, while still offering clever metaphors and essential insights. Where I struggled a bit was with the pacing. The chapters are short and end abruptly, and although there is a very good narrative reason for this structure, I still found myself a little frustrated with it as a reader. Stealing is out on February 7th from Harper Collins. If you choose to preorder this book (which I do recommend to support this author and this powerful story), consider using the HC Union’s affiliate link to support their ongoing effort to negotiate fair wages.

Pros: Annie B. Jones of the From the Front Porch podcast raved about this book, and I trust her judgment! I was a bit nervous when I started reading this book that I would not enjoy it because it is told from the point of view of a child, but I ended up appreciating that the author used this point of view rather than that of an adult looking back on her childhood. (The audiobook narrator also did a great job voicing the main character in a way that was not annoying/too childlike.) This book focuses on a girl who, in the 1950s, is sent to a Christian boarding school rather than being allowed to live with her Native American family members. This is a timely topic as stories about the horrors of such boarding schools are in the news. I think readers who loved the Nickle Boys should read this book.

Cons: This is not a con but a note that there are content warnings some readers may want to know before reading, including sexual abuse of a child.

Thank you to NetGalley and Mariner Books for the opportunity to read this book.

See full review in the ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION: https://www.ajc.com/life/arts-culture/book-review-stealing-humanizes-mistreatment-of-indigenous-youth/GPF3OH75MFEAFMUFBJZVRSR3KI/

Pulitzer-Prize finalist Margaret Verble’s fourth novel “Stealing” is an historical fiction about a young Cherokee girl in the Midwest who is removed from her family and placed in a residential school in the 1950s. Verble wrote this tender and eye-opening tale in 2007 but didn’t find a receptive audience until the First Nations boarding school scandal in Canada broke in 2021. With a fresh social context in place to frame her narrative, Verble has delivered a nuanced yet powerful examination of the impact of forced Christianity on the indigenous population. And what a story she tells.


Karen “Kit” Crockett narrates her own tale through a diary she’s writing while interned at the fictional Ashley Lordard Children’s Home. She weaves back and forth through time, starting at age 6 after the death of her mother and revealing how she came to be removed from her father’s custody at age 12. Instead of being sent to live with her Cherokee family, who are desperate to care for her, she’s placed in a boarding school so she can “get some education and good moral values...”

This is a unique story told from the perspective of a young Cherokee girl forced into a Christian boarding school. Be prepared for really tough and graphic scenes but you’ll also be charmed by Kit’s resilience. I loved this book and hope to see if pick up some attention on bookstagram. The writing is superb and the story is an important one.

This was a beautifully written, yet heart-wrenching story about a young Cherokee girl named Kit Crockett who was raised by her father after her mother’s death. While he was still grieving, Kit spent a lot of time on her own, fishing or reading Nancy Drew books. Then she met a mysterious woman (Bella) who moved into the cabin down the road where her uncle had once lived. Kit and Bella quickly became friends and found comfort in spending time with one another, but Bella had a bit of a reputation and not everyone thought it was appropriate for Kit to be around her.

Tragedy struck and Kit was removed from her home and sent to a boarding school that aimed at stripping Native students of their heritage while also forcing Christianity on them. During that time, Kit and others experienced sexual abuse, but she secretly kept a diary to recount her time there as well as reveal what she had forgotten leading up to her father’s trial.

I really enjoyed the narration from Kit’s POV. She’s was a smart and inquisitive girl, though in many ways naive as well. I think having spent so much time on her own led her to develop a closeness to nature, but her innocence becomes blindingly clear after she befriends Bella and when she is sent to the boarding school. Overall, I thought it was a great story, though heartbreaking throughout most of the Kit’s young life. I recommend it, but do want to forewarn readers that it may be triggering in regard to childhood sexual abuse.

*Thank you to NetGalley and Mariner Books for providing a copy of this book to review.*

I really loved the perspective, told by a 9 year old girl. It was so insightful and raw, your heart just broke for Kit. But I loved her grit and resolve, passed down by her grandmother, mother, and aunts and uncles. It showed the horrors of residential schools for Native children and how religion can be a tool for evil. I liked that the ending was open-ended.

Putting One Foot in Front of the Other

Just how wicked is a world that treats its treasures, its children, with such cruelty over and over again? In Margaret Verble’s “Stealing” we are crushed by nine-year-old Kit’s telling of what life is like when her Cherokee mother dies and she is unable to count on her father. She befriends a neighbor, a free-spirited young woman named Bella, only to see this confidante trashed by the community.

Despite having loving relatives who want to take her in, Kim finds herself torn away and sentenced to a religious boarding school. There she is subject to unforgivable abuses that history has documented far too often. Her coping mechanism is to mentally numb herself and closet her feelings… how else is a child to deal with monsters?

Last year Margaret Verble gave us the magical “When Two Feathers Fell from the Sky.” This story is a little more gritty, a little less fantasy. We are slapped with racism, child sexual abuse, religious fanaticism and hypocrisy… and the whole matter of “cleansing” Native Americans of their heritage. These issues are all the more powerful when filtered through Kit’s remarkable spirit.

“I don’t give up hope. That would be against my nature. I am descended from people who survived the Trail of Tears… I’ll just put one foot in front of the other until I get to where I have to go... Those that gave up hope and stopped on the road died in the snow.”

At times I could hear Scout’s voice from “To Kill a Mockingbird” echoing in Kit’s words– just the way the world was being processed in a young girl’s mind. She is an impressive character; Margaret Verble has given us a beautiful portrayal of an innocent refusing to be defeated by the world.

Thank you to Mariner Books and NetGalley for providing an advance reader copy in exchange for an honest review. #Stealing #NetGalley