Review will post 5/7/23

Angeline Boulley’s Firekeeper’s Daughter is straight up one of my favorite books of all time. Loved it beyond words. So needless to say, Warrior Girl Unearthed had some big ol’ shoes to fill. First, to answer your most burning question, yes we get some much-loved updates about some of our faves from FD! I was so giddy excited to catch back up with them, even if they didn’t happen to be the main focus (though Daunis is still a pretty important character, no worries).

In this book, we follow Perry, who is interning (mostly against her will) in the summer to pay her Aunt Daunis back after she crashes the Jeep she’d given her and her twin, Pauline. Pauline is stoked to be part of the program, but Perry had no such motivations. But, as she starts her summer journey, she begins to find out a lot of facts about remains and artifacts of Native peoples which are basically being used by non-Natives for financial gain. Some are sold on sites like eBay, some in local shops, but Perry is infuriated by the fact that these artifacts (and in some cases, entire bodies) are not being returned to their tribes, due to some loophole in the law. It’s pretty horrible, I concur, and loved that Perry became so invested in this cause.

The thing about Perry is, she doesn’t always think before she acts. So she gets herself in some trouble more than once, and I do wish she had learned a bit more from her actions. I loved how deeply the characters (and obviously the author, too) care about their culture. I feel like I learned so much while reading this book, and the author delivers this information in a way that the reader will find compelling, and also, be outraged about, as they should be.

I liked the characters certainly, though not quite as much as FD. Perry was great, and her love for her culture was great, but I think Daunis will just always have a special place in my heart. I felt like Perry underwent a lot of personal growth during the story too, though I do wish she’d become a tad less impulsive? But I think maybe that is just who she is as a person heh. Overall, another huge win!

Bottom Line: There is so much love for Native people and their culture in this story, and it was incredibly eye opening while still being very enjoyable.

Worthy Follow-Up to The Firekeeper’s Daughter:

I fell in love with Daunis, her family, her home of Sugar Island, her clan, her tribe, her dedication to her heritage. I felt much the same about Perry Firekeeper-Birch, Daunis’ niece/cousin who takes the lead in this new book.

Years after the first book, we meet the twins, Perry and Pauline, as they do their summer internships at the tribal center in Sault Ste. Marie. Pauline is labeled the ‘smart’ one, and yet Perry takes the lead, which I love.

Perry is impulsive, wise, passionate, loving, and wholly dedicated to the Anishanaabe history and restoration of her ancestors as she works to recover these things from an unscrupulous seller. A mystery is also woven into the story, with the disappearance of indigenous young women, tying this book into topical news of the day.

In so many ways, I learned from this story - the lack of federal laws to protect these young women and to respect tribal heritage, the tradition of language, sacred ceremonies, and use of artifacts to tie together a clan or a tribe, and the ways in which universities both help and harm indigenous people. I was fascinated, intrigued, and angered by much of what I learned.

This is a Young Adult book that would be powerful to put in a teen’s hands, as well as any adult - I mean, my education back in the day pretty much missed all of indigenous history, except of course the lies like Columbus Day, Pocahontas, Thanksgiving, etc. Loved this one - highly recommend.

This is an excellent book. The weaving of Native American traditions in with current day life is a pleasure to read. Would highly recommend this book!

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for an advanced copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

Angeline Boulley’s debut novel is one of the best books I’ve ever read, so I couldn’t wait to read this one. Warrior Girl Unearthed is told from the teenage Perry’s point of view (Daunis’ niece if you’ve read Firekeeper’s Daughter). She’s bold, outspoken, and impulsive, and these characteristics can often get her into trouble. But she is most often finding herself in potentially dangerous situations because of her strong passion for her Native community and the injustices she has witnessed against them throughout her life.

This novel takes place over an entire summer in which Perry participates in an internship program in order to save up money to pay for damages she has caused to her aunt’s jeep. Although working a job was not Perry’s original plan for her summer break, it introduces Perry to several issues that are affecting her community, mainly issues connected to items and ancestral bones stolen from Native land, awakening a strong desire within Perry to return these stolen items to their Native homes—no matter the cost.

This novel informs its readers of the many ways US laws have failed the Native community, specifically their failure to ensure the return of stolen items to their Tribes and their failure to protect Native women. Boulley introduces readers to these issues and laws pertaining to them well. It doesn’t read like an informational text at all, yet I learned a lot of information through Perry’s experiences and finished the book with a desire to complete more research on my own.

I did personally feel that the first part of the book was a little slow compared to the rest of it; however, about halfway through I was unable to put it down. And the first part does set up the plot well. I especially love Perry’s friends and family. She has a strong support system, and Boulley does a great job at creating side characters that matter as much as her main character. It was also nice to get small updates on Daunis. Overall, this book, through Perry’s strong emotional connection to events, made me angry, heartbroken, and hopeful with and for her.

My only complaint is that there were a couple parts that confused me as the transition of events felt strange, unclear, or too sudden. This could be because I read an ARC though, so I do look forward to the book’s release date so that I can read a finalized version of the novel .

To say this read evoked a lot of emotions would be an understatement. When I say I felt everything, I really mean I felt it all. I laughed for the joy Perry had in each of her friends. I was moved by the tribe standing with one of their own. And I was so, so angry that people are treated so poorly because of the color of their skin, their culture, their beliefs, and so much more. My heart continues to hurt days after reading the book.

I loved the book and seeing the cultural aspects and their importance to her tribe. The story itself is beautiful. The last 10% was not only chaotic, but the ending sped by faster than a race. This would have been fine, except it just seemed out of place. The rest of the book was beautifully constructed, the details were beautiful, and instead of that we kind of just got a brush over of what happened. I feel like it took away from the rest of the book.

It did feel like there might be another book within this tribe, since we’re kind of left hanging at the end, and I’ll no doubt be reading that one, too.

Thank you to NetGalley and Henry Holt & Co for a gifted copy in exchange for an honest review.

4/5

We have returned to Sugar Island and are seeing some familiar faces from FIREKEEPER'S DAUGHTER, and I am happy to say that for the most part WARRIOR GIRL UNEARTHED is a worthy follow up to one of my favorite books in recent memory. Once again Boulley does a great job of creating engaging characters, a well crafted mystery with a slow burn build, and bringing in explorations of modern Indigenous themes of self discovery, stolen culture, systemic racism, and reclaiming voice and identity. I really loved Perry as a main character, as she is hilarious and forthright, but also has a lot of interesting growth and layers as her story goes on and her drive to reclaim stolen and appropriated Anishinaabe artifacts and remains and bring them home to her people. Boulley does a great job of bringing up a lot of heavy and complex topics and integrating them into the story, making it easy to digest and easy to understand for the audience who may have very little background knowledge (given that I used to work in museums I'm pretty familiar with NAGPRA, and this is such a good introduction to it). I also liked the dichotomy of Perry fighting against this cultural violence while the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls epidemic hits close to the community, showing that violence against Indigenous people comes in many forms and can cause damage in many ways. I will say that, while I love Daunis from FIREKEEPER'S DAUGHTER and liked seeing what she was up to, there was one element about her story that felt like it was awkwardly tossed in to this tale just to quickly wrap things up. it just didn't feel like it fit too well, and kind of took away from the story at hand. But that's just a quibble in a sea of well earned praise.

WARRIOR GIRL UNEARTHED is another great YA thriller from Angeline Boulley. I loved going back to Sugar Island and revisiting the people there, and I am VERY curious to see where she takes us next.

🅶🅴🅽🆁🅴—𝑀𝓎𝓈𝓉𝑒𝓇𝓎 / 𝒴𝒜
🗓ℙ𝕦𝕓 𝔻𝕒𝕥𝕖—𝕄𝕒𝕪 𝟚, 𝟚𝟘𝟚𝟛

✂️ P L O T L I N E
Perry Firekeeper-Birch discovers a secret that impacts the ancestors of her tribe. She has no choice but to take matters in to her own hands and figure out a way to take back something that belongs to her people. With the help of her twin sister and friends, they plan a heist to take back what is theirs. She must be smart and avoid becoming the next missing Ingenious women and victim in the ongoing high profile murder investigation. Can she pull of uncovering the mystery of the missing women, while taking back what belongs the her tribe?

💭 ⓂⓎ ⓉⒽⓄⓊⒼⒽⓉⓈ
I loved Fire Keepers Daughter so much and went in really thinking that I would love this one too. Fire Keepers Daughter had so much depth, and I felt like that was laking in Warrior Girl Unearthed. This story was so busy, there was so many things going on and I couldn’t figure out where the story was heading for the first 2/3 of the book. The last third picked up a bit, but I wasn’t invested as much as I hoped. There were also so many characters in this story and it made it hard to feel any sort of connection with some of them. I would still recommend reading this book because there were a lot of interesting things that I learned.I loved learning more about the history of the Anishinaabe tribe and about Native American Artifacts.

📚 𝚁𝚎𝚊𝚍 𝚝𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝚋𝚘𝚘𝚔 𝚒𝚏 𝚢𝚘𝚞 𝚕𝚒𝚔𝚎:
💫First person POV
💫YA mystery reads
💫Learning about Native American customs and artifacts
💫Love museums

🦴𝕄𝕐 ℝ𝔸𝕋𝕀ℕ𝔾 🦴
⭐️⭐️⭐️

💕Q U O T E: “𝒟𝑜𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝓇𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉 𝓉𝒽𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒻𝑜𝓇 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝓇𝒾𝑔𝒽𝓉 𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓈𝑜𝓃, 𝓌𝒾𝓉𝒽 𝒶 𝑔𝑜𝑜𝒹 𝒽𝑒𝒶𝓇𝓉 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝒸𝓁𝑒𝒶𝓇 𝒾𝓃𝓉𝑒𝓃𝓉𝒾𝑜𝓃𝓈, 𝓂𝒶𝓉𝓉𝑒𝓇𝓈.”

🙏Thank you NetGalley, Macmillan, Henry Holt and Co., and Angeline Boulley for this ARC in exchange for my honest thoughts 💕

Ooooh, I love it.

I made peace that the first book and this book use an unrealistic thriller element as the plot point of the story. I was mildly annoyed by it overall in the first book, but accepting that this is the way Boulley moves her book forward, helped me love this book more. This is a sort of companion, sort of sequel as Daunis is present in the background of this story, with a major life update at the end of this book, but it's about Perry, her niece. And twin to Pauline. Perry gets her car taken away and must repay her aunt. She and other peers are going to be working their summer jobs on the island in capacities like fishing and museum work both continuing to learn about their community and culture, but also contribute to its future.

Perry from the start is a pistol of a character. And that fire (or warrior spirit) is what propels the story when during her first work assignment she realizes how museums and colleges and institutions have held items and actual bodies of their ancestors hostage in the name of "research" and not being able to identify the provenance of the items and therefore don't return them to the Nations they belong to including bones and baskets.

The secondary characters are wonderfully deep. The learning that non-Indigenous readers will pull from it like vocabulary but also laws, repatriation, and politics is powerful. The action is intricately plotted (and gets intense), but I felt the passion Perry had and laughed with her when she was a smartass and rooted for her to win over the idiots. Love what's unfolding in the Sugar Island universe and want more!

Another gripping, educational, indigenous thriller from Angelina Boulley. I couldn’t put this down. You could read this as a stand alone, but I would read Boulley’s first book first.

The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) is the central theme in this book and as a lawyer, I thought it was done well. You don’t have to know a thing about NAGPRA to read this book; Boulley will tell you everything you need to know through her characters.

The characters are tenacious and inspiring. This book is also a coming of age story, and one in following ancestral footsteps. It’s beautiful done. Complete with laugh out loud moments too.

I adored the story, the world building was amazing. I love meeting the different characters. I felt completely immersed in the story and couldn't stop reading it. The writing was also really nice. I couldn't put the book down and I can't wait for others to read and enjoy this story as well.

After crashing her aunt's Jeep, Perry Firekeeper-Birch finds herself forced to take on a summer internship to repay her aunt for the damages. Her easy summer soon becomes a summer of learning hard truths about her ancestors, their remains, and repatriation. As she struggles to bring artifacts and remains back to her tribe, Perry must also face the reality that local women are going missing. With the help of her friends, Team Misfit Toys, Perry works to bring justice to her community, the ancestors, and to the missing women.

Thanks to Macmillan Children's Publishing Group, Henry Holt and Co. (BYR) for the copy of this ARC!

"Warriors do for their people what others can't or won't."

Angeline Boulley is such a talented author. While her books are YA, she writes across genres so that they're perfect for anyone who likes YA, contemporary fiction, thriller/mystery, and a hint of romance. She also writes about incredibly important topics and educates through often too-real fictonal storylines.

Warrior Girl Unearthed follows the story of Perry Firekeeper-Birch and navigates through missing Indigenous women and NAGPRA (Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act), the federal law that allows tribes to request the return of ancestral remains and sacred items. We quickly unveil the amount of injustice present in both of these areas, and Perry is determined to take some matters into her own hands with her group of friends, Team Misfit Toys. My emotions were ALL OVER THE PLACE during this read and I honestly learned a lot.

Read if you:
- want to learn from an OwnVoices Native author
- enjoy YA books, mysteries and/or heists
- like cameos from an author's past books
- have wondered where museum items come from
- followed the case of Savanna LaFontaine-Greywind and the creation of Savanna's Act

What a wonderful companion to Firekeeper's Daughter. Boulley is a force in literature. I will be reading all of her books always. The plot and the characters were wonderful and I couldn't wait to keep reading.

Wow, Boulley's books are INTENSE! Her teenagers end up in some very serious situations. I found this book comparable to her first, and I liked that one a lot. Both books made me want to keep reading to figure out the mysteries. I like that Warrior Girl followed characters from Firekeeper's Daughter, several years in the future. I found the protagonist, Perry, to be very frustrating but in a believable teenage way. She was so impetuous but also such an awesome fighter for her family, friends, and culture! I would definitely recommend this book to my high school students, but I would warn them that the book includes murder and kidnapping. That said, these mature themes call attention to the important issue of Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, as well as cultural theft and appropriation. I love that the nonfiction texts the characters reference in the story are actual texts by Native authors, too.

Thanks to Henry Holt and Co and Netgalley for providing me with an advance copy of this book.

4.5 stars. Perry Firekeeper-Birch can't wait to spend her summer fishing — except she'll have to, because she gets roped into the town's internship program and lands herself indoors, cleaning museum display cases. At first loathsome of her new role, Perry discovers that the local university has been hoarding Indigenous artifacts and, even worse, the bones of ancestors taken from their resting places. This lights a fire inside Perry, and she enlists the help of her fellow interns, the Misfit Toys, to enact a plan that will bring the ancestors home. Is it entirely by-the-book? No, not at all, and Perry will quickly feel the sting of her rash actions. All the while, Indigenous women from the community are disappearing, and it feels like something truly sinister is at work...

Oh how I adored this book. Perry is a perfect teen protagonist, anxious to get on with her hobbies and rueful that she gets stuck in a dusty museum. What I especially loved about her journey was learning about repatriation alongside her, and feeling the twin flame of indignation and disgust rise in myself. There are very few "gray area" characters here, and I think some will surprise you when they reveal their true colors.

The pace of this narrative is a bit of a slow burn up front, but it starts to really pick up after the first third or so. I found myself unable to put the book down until I knew what was going on and where the story would end up. It's a lovely blend of genres: a little bit of mystery, history, and fantasy thrown into a contemporary midwest setting with unique and vivid characters that I relished.

This is the sort of book that serves a dual purpose — it is at once entertaining and educational, which is (in my opinion) the highest calling of literature. Did I note down the books Perry was reading about repatriation so I can read them myself? Absolutely. And I believe this is what Angeline Boulley intended, to teach others about NAGPRA and some of the challenges faces modern-day Indigenous communities. I hope it sparks others to learn more and to take action when and where they can.

Thank you to Angeline Boulley, Henry Holt & Co, and NetGalley for my advance digital copy.

Angeline Boulley writes stories and characters with sooo much life that when you are done reading, it feels like you are saying goodbye to lifelong friends. I was bowled over by Firekeeper’s daughter and Warrior girl unearthed was therefore a highly anticipated read. And I was not at all disappointed. Perry has all my heart along with Cooper. And not just these two, every single character was made so memorable and left a lasting mark. There were so many moments were I was filled with impotent rage and crying with frustration at the injustice of it all but at the end Boulley still manages to leave you with a sense a hope rather than desperation and helplessness. If I had one complaint it would be that the ending felt rushed and a little half baked compared to the rest of the book. It was like a very minor 2-3% of the book so I am willing to ignore it. Highly recommended for anyone who loves a good coming of age YA novel or thriller full of heart.

What wouldn't you do for your people and your culture? Perry Firekeeper-Birch is going to find out. Perry, the outgoing slacker twin of the family, has no interest in an internship with her Tribe. She just wants to fish, but after some rule breaking, there is no choice. Now she's stuck working in the quiet Tribal Archives. But, while their she begins to learn about NAGPRA, Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. Most importantly, that some of her Tribes culturally significant items, and even people, are retained by collectors and museums. These people, purposefully keeping these items under lies and fabrication. The story is quick and engaging. Further in the story there is plans for a heist and a mystery threaded throughout. There is space to learn alot about NAGPRA and between chapters the author quotes real nonfiction titles and articles pertaining to it. I was not able to read an Authors Note in the ARC, but I expect the Author will explain more of this process. The story itself also covers a lot of great topics like Grooming/Assault, Race, and Anxiety. The story also references the ongoing crime of missing Native Women, a topic readers may not be aware of. Definitely will be recommending it to YA and Adult readers. (Thank You to Netgalley and Henry Holt & Co.)

What a wonderful book! The story is a difficult one to read, because you know it is based on real life, but Angeline Boulley treats her characters and their stories with care and love. Perry thought she would have an easy summer fishing and driving boats, but a car incident to pay for creates a whole new look for her days. When a chance happening changes your life, sometimes it also helps you realize your life path. Keep writing Ms. Boulley! I will continue reading and recommending your work!

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for this ARC. And thanks to Angeline Boulley for writing another book and completely avoiding a sophomore slump. This was sooo good! I rooted for Perry just as much as I did Daunis. I was delighted with just about everything about this. I love how the story dealt with racism, of course, and missing Native women, AND the problem of unreturned remains and artifacts that were legally required to have been returned already, AND mental illness, AND quantum requirements, but woven so carefully into Perry's story that you can't separate them out--just like real life. This was just excellent and I recommend it highly; I promise you will not be disappointed at all if you loved Firekeeper's Daughter.

Briefly, this one stars Perry, niece to our favorite character Daunis from FD. Perry is excited to have a summer full of fishing and fun until she is forced to intern at the tribal center. There is works with different community members and discovers ancestral items and remains that are in the wrong hands. With wonderful side characters to help, Perry hatches a plan to bring her ancestors home.

I love Boulley’s storytelling. The way she captures her communities customs, love and history in her stories is so wonderful. It is a heartfelt story (in only the way that YA stories can be - emotional and passionate) but brimming with so much information regarding the systems that still are failing Indigenous communalities. I HIGHLY recommend and can’t wait for everyone to get their hands on this!