Amazing Must Read Book

Five Little Indians by Michelle Good

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Five Little Indians by Michelle Good should be mandatory reading in all Canadian junior high and high schools. I put this book down only because I had to regroup myself. I kept thinking, “I didn’t know,” and then I got angry with thoughts, “Why didn’t I know?” Horrific, does not aptly describe how I felt. Thank you Good for writing such a moving novel which didn’t shy away from the hurting. I wish I could write I get it, but honestly I don’t know how any Canadian can think they got it, unless they lived it. The multi-generational pain was clearly evident in this novel.

I fell in love with so many characters in this novel who each provided a snapshot into a life lived yet lost because of the religious mission schools they were forced to attend. A resounding theme of how the Catholic Church tried to re-educate the Indian through abuse and torture I keenly felt. I also liked how the author easily moved the narrative to how institutions like the RCMP, and the courts continued to uphold the beliefs that Indians were second-class citizens.

I was shocked to learn how children, taken at the tender age of six, where forced to stay at least a decade and then one day forced out the door of the mission with no life skills; no idea how to navigate a world to secure employment, and no way of walking back to their community as they were broken shells of the children they had been when forced to away.

Each character Good wrote scored a point and perspective as a summation for what so many Indian children in Canada faced. There was Clara who ate the hatred until she mastered how to take that fight into the world while also trying to reclaim her own identity, heritage and soul; Lucy, so strong in her educational pursuit even after being told she’d amount to nothing to prove everyone wrong but who had the strength to dare motherhood with a tender forgiving heart; Kenny, I loved deeply for his strength to run away from the mission, while later always feeling the need to run to his demons but who had an inner depth to always provide for his family in his own ways; Howie who made me cry with how he was stolen from his mother because she took him to see family in Canada and Maisie, so tough who tried to tackle her rip from her culture by internalizing trauma and pain.

Good did an excellent job of describing with compassion and insight how so many survivors of residential schools had to learn to cope. As a reader, I often felt like I was walking along as a witness to their painful journey.

Thank you Good for tackling such a heart-wrenching, soul-piercing epic disgrace of our Canadian history no one should ever shy away from discussing.



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Five Little Indians