I had requested this book from the library but I didn’t remember what it was about. Every time it showed up on my ipad I sent it back and asked for it to be delivered later. Then I saw it start to show up on Best Of lists. The next time it appeared in my library app, I decided to give it a try.

This book definitely lives up to the hype.

It reminded me a lot of Babel. A girl is taken into a school that is run by a colonial power. She is trying to hold on to her identity and culture while learning what the other people have to teach her.

“And the Anglish have the nerve to call my people savage and wild and all that nonsense, when they can’t think of any better way to solve a fight than to kill one another over it?”

She isn’t the only indigenous person in her school. There is a boy who was raised in white society after the death of his parents. He has been shunned by the other students for being indigenous but isn’t willing to find out more about his background because of his own internalized racism.

This book covers the first year of her schooling. I love how determined she is to be fully herself in the face of the disapproval of the rich people in her school.

“There wasn’t any corn, which seemed practically blasphemous for any kind of celebration in October, but the Anglish could be very strange.”

I also liked the fact that this book upends a common YA fantasy trope. There is a bit of a love triangle. In this case though, Anequs decides to handle this by intending to marry them both. She hasn’t told her love interests that yet though.

I’m looking forward to reading the next installment.