Firekeeper's Daughter

Daunis Fontaine wanted to start fresh in college and study medicine. The biracial 18-year-old never felt like she quite fit in, either in her town or on the nearby Ojibwe reservation. But in Angeline Boulley’s twisting novel, a family tragedy unexpectedly keeps Daunis home for a year—and she unintentionally witnesses a crime. Soon, the teen is pulled into a whirlwind of secrets and mystery as she helps the FBI with a high-stakes investigation that hits close to home. Part thriller, part romance and part examination of Indigenous identity, Boulley’s forceful and thought-provoking debut questions many of the tropes around policing that often appear in the crime genre. Boulley—herself an enrolled member of the Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians—delivers a riveting page turner with a remarkable heroine. An immediate hit upon its March 2021 publication, Firekeeper’s Daughter was a Reese’s Book Club selection and a No. 1 New York Times best seller, and it has been optioned by the Obamas’ production company to be adapted into a Netflix series. —Madeleine Carlisle

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