Five Little Indians: A Novel Paperback – Deckle Edge, April 14, 2020
by Michelle Good (Author)
4.7 out of 5 stars 392 ratings
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304 pages
WINNER: Governor General’s Literary Award for Fiction
WINNER: Amazon First Novel Awards
Finalist: Scotiabank Giller Prize
Finalist: Atwood Gibson Writers Trust Prize
Finalist: BC & Yukon Book Prize
Shortlist: Indigenous Voices Awards
Finalist: Kobo Emerging Author Prize
National Bestseller; A Globe and Mail Top 100 Book of the Year; A CBC Best Book of the Year; An Apple Best Book of the Year; A Kobo Best Book of the Year; An Indigo Best Book of the Year
Taken from their families when they are very small and sent to a remote, church-run residential school, Kenny, Lucy, Clara, Howie and Maisie are barely out of childhood when they are finally released after years of detention.
Alone and without any skills, support or families, the teens find their way to the seedy and foreign world of Downtown Eastside Vancouver, where they cling together, striving to find a place of safety and belonging in a world that doesn’t want them. The paths of the five friends cross and crisscross over the decades as they struggle to overcome, or at least forget, the trauma they endured during their years at the Mission.
Fuelled by rage and furious with God, Clara finds her way into the dangerous, highly charged world of the American Indian Movement. Maisie internalizes her pain and continually places herself in dangerous situations. Famous for his daring escapes from the school, Kenny can’t stop running and moves restlessly from job to job—through fishing grounds, orchards and logging camps—trying to outrun his memories and his addiction. Lucy finds peace in motherhood and nurtures a secret compulsive disorder as she waits for Kenny to return to the life they once hoped to share together. After almost beating one of his tormentors to death, Howie serves time in prison, then tries once again to re-enter society and begin life anew.
With compassion and insight, Five Little Indians chronicles the desperate quest of these residential school survivors to come to terms with their past and, ultimately, find a way forward.
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About the Author
Michelle Good is a Cree writer and a member of the Red Pheasant Cree Nation in Saskatchewan. After working for Indigenous organizations for twenty-five years she obtained a law degree and advocated for residential school survivors for over fourteen years. Good earned a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing at the University of British Columbia while still practising law and managing her own law firm. Her poems, short stories, and essays have been published in magazines and anthologies across Canada, and her poetry was included on two lists of the best Canadian poetry in 2016 and 2017. Five Little Indians, her first novel, won the HarperCollins/UBC Best New Fiction Prize. Michelle Good now lives and writes in the southern interior British Columbia.
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Publisher : Harper Perennial (April 14, 2020)
Customer Reviews: 4.7 out of 5 stars 392 ratings
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Reader in the Pacific
5.0 out of 5 stars Cultural Genocide
Reviewed in the United States on December 5, 2020
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A group of indigenous youth try in varying forms to overcome the trauma inflicted on them by a church run residential school in the British Columbia interior.
I grew up in Vancouver in the 60’s and my parents had First Nations boarders going to the community colleges in town. For most it was not a great fit despite the best of intentions. The City was and still is a hard place.
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bz
4.0 out of 5 stars a gripping story of children in Indian Schools of Canada
Reviewed in the United States on April 6, 2021
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The story was engrossing and certainly helped me understand the plight of the children of Native Canadian Indians. It was a very sobering account of the country’s treatment of the Indians and “the most horrible treatment of children by the Canadian Government” for which they are ashamed...related to me as such by my Bookclub members, 50% of whom are adult Canadians.
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5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent story, fabulous writing. Book for the ages.
Reviewed in the United States on February 19, 2021
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One of my best books of the year. Fantastic character development, engaging story, heartbreaking theme. From page one, I felt drawn into the lives of the characters.
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Ice Bear
5.0 out of 5 stars A must read
Reviewed in the United States on June 14, 2021
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This needs to be read by every white Canadian. It will help all of us understand the true impact of residential school survivors.
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Boomerbroadcast
5.0 out of 5 stars How much longer will they have to suffer?
Reviewed in the United States on June 5, 2021
Is it a coincidence that I started reading Five Little Indians by Michelle Good the same week we read in the newspapers about the discovery of a mass grave containing 215 bodies of Indigenous children in Kamloops, B.C.? Governments at all levels as well as the Catholic church (although it wasn’t only Catholic churches that ran residential schools) have a lot to answer for. It’s hard to conceive of little children being wrenched from their homes at six years of age because the government and the church assisted by the RCMP egotistically and erroneously insisted they could do a better job of raising them than the children’s parents. Beyond belief.
The Catholic church is simply a business that needs to be fed. While professing a higher calling, they need financial support to survive and pay their overheads. Kidnapping and recruiting entire generations of indigenous children to become future followers seemed like it would offer a guaranteed revenue stream. And, because the Canadian government wanted to assimilate Indigenous people into the general population, they were complicit. But the plan was horribly flawed and later generations are still paying the price.
Every Canadian is aware of the problems within so many of our indigenous communities. There are shortages of jobs, affordable fresh fruit and vegetables, social problems including, overcrowding, poverty and substance abuse. How can governments allow communities to still have “Boil Water” alerts in place for more than 25 years! We’re all tired of the excuses and impatient to see these problems resolved.
Five Little Indians is a fictional story based on real-life recollections, of five native children who were seized from their parents in the late sixties. They were transported to unknown destinations and placed in cruel and despotic residential schools run by sadistic nuns, priests, and religious brothers. The fallout from their experiences affected not only their own lives but those of their parents, their children, extended family, and subsequent generations. The author is of Cree heritage and she relates the stories she heard from her own family to create this moving, compelling novel.
Author Michelle Good is a member of the Red Pheasant Cree Nation in Saskatchewan. Good has an MFA and a law degree from the University of British Columbia and, as a lawyer, advocated for residential-school survivors. Her insights, intelligence and experiences with the struggles of indigenous people are first-hand.
Michelle Good posted a picture on Twitter with the caption, “That’s my mom in the front row and my auntie in the second row, behind the barbed wire in their holocaust clothes. I wonder how many of these babies didn’t make it home.”
The main characters in Five Little Indians, Lucy, Kenny, Clara, Howie, and Maisie meet as children at a remote residential school in British Columbia. Although they are not allowed to communicate with each other, they form a psychic bond through their mutual hate of the facility and their suffering resulting from being separated for years from their families. When they reconnect as adults living in Vancouver’s rough east side, the scars from their residential school experience and separation from their families remain. They cope in different ways.
The conditions described in this book are brutal but it is important to read their story in order to gain a better understanding of what these children and their families endured. The horrors did not end in 1996 when the last of the residential schools closed, as former inmates and their families are still suffering the repercussions generations later.
Four years ago I read and reviewed (In order to be truly proud, Canada still has work to do) another book, Invisible North by Alexandra Shimo. As a young journalist, she moved to a reserve to experience and further understand the challenges faced by indigenous Canadians. The book was powerful reading and I highly recommend reading it as well.
Every day the newspapers print stories of decades of abuse. The Kamloops genocide is just the latest. The plight of young Chanie Wenjack brought to our attention by the late Gord Downie of Tragically Hip is another. There are tens of thousands and the scars remain.
How has Canada allowed this to continue unresolved, throwing billions of dollars at COVID relief while Indigenous communities do not have clean drinking water, adequate accommodation or affordable, healthy food? Five Little Indians should be required reading in every high school curriculum. When you read it, you’ll never forget it.
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Jessie W.
5.0 out of 5 stars An incredibly powerful book everyone needs to read!
Reviewed in the United States on May 11, 2021
“They call us survivors... I don’t think I survived. Do you?” {pg. 251}
Told from alternating points of view, Good intertwines the stories of 5 residential school students as they struggle to survive in Vancouver.
If you’re looking for a beautifully written book that will not only educate you but stick with you forever, this is the one for you. I don’t even want to say *too* much about it so you can have the same shocking experience as I did. I knew Native Americans were treated terribly, but this opened my eyes to the atrocious extent in which they were abused & traumatized.
Parts of this book are very triggering (ex: substance abuse, sexually traumatic experiences). While I found them difficult to read I realize the significance of discussing these issues + bringing them to light. This has been the (quiet) reality for far too many people.
This book catapulted me out of a long reading slump! With a perfect pace the author established a connection to these authentic characters & evoked strong emotion immediately.
I loved how we got to follow their individual stories over the course of 2 & a half decades with flashbacks sprinkled throughout. And without spoiling anything, I’m glad it ended the way it did. Despite all the darkness, there’s a glimpse of hope as we see characters heal, find each other, and fight for justice.
It was also interesting to learn about this side of Vancouver I was previously unaware of! I’ve actually been to Vancouver once before taking off on a cruise & thought the city was lovely. I was completely ignorant to everyone struggling right around the corner in East Hastings.
The next time you hear someone ask “why can’t they just get over it? It was so long ago🙄”, hand them this book. Nearly every Indigenous family has been affected and the effects on communities are still there today.
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C. Ellen Connally
5.0 out of 5 stars The tragic long term effects of child abuse
Reviewed in the United States on June 5, 2021
If I could give this book more than 5 stars I would. It's the story of the long term effects of the child abuse suffered by native children in Canadian Mission School. It would be interesting to read the logic of the Canadian government that thought that had to take children away from their parents. But that's what happened.
The people who ran these institutions were monsters who preyed on the children and abused them in unspeakable ways. Margaret Good tells the story of five of the victims. I can see why the book received awards.
Its a tragic story but well told by good.
A book that I would highly recommend.
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tinky
5.0 out of 5 stars Essential read for all Canadians
Reviewed in Canada on June 3, 2021
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I was gutted to hear of the remains of the 215 Indigenous Children found in a mass grave in Kamloops in late May 2021. I immediately purchased this book. This book was heart wrenching. The stories are incredibly sad - the abuses suffered under the father and nuns, the lack of support when they graduated from the school, the desperation, and how and why they end up in the downtown east side. I didn't grow up in Canada but have lived here now for 45+ years. For the first time, I was ashamed to be Canadian. This is not just a "dark chapter" in our country's history = it's a whole book. This was genocide and crimes against humanity perpetrated by our governments, and churches - who took "Christ out of Christian". Thank you Michelle Good for giving us some insight into residential survivors and their families. It should be a must read for school aged children, along with the Underground Railroad.
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MGK96
5.0 out of 5 stars wow, Wow, WOW!!!!!!!
Reviewed in Canada on April 8, 2021
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Michelle Good’s novel is amazing.
I devoured it in an afternoon that turned into a night that turned into a very late night.
I laughed, i cried, i laughed while crying, i gasped, i gripped the pages white knuckling them as i prayed for the characters.
Ive never seen such a unromanticized and relatable portrayal or trauma survival and trauma responses. Without sensationalizing or creating trauma-porn. Good has really found a way to tell the continuation of life after the residential school system and how these characters continue to survive through it.
One of the best books I’ve ever read.
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Ron Edward
5.0 out of 5 stars excellent book on the residencial schools abuses.
Reviewed in Canada on November 24, 2020
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This book made me so angry when I read it. The church was supposed to be a protector of kids but caused so much damage. Our society really messed up on this one. I had never heard of these schools until we moved to Port Hardy and I heard of the school in Alert Bay. Oddly we were up there at the same time as they write this book. It sure was hushed up as to what went on in the school. What puzles me is why on earth would they send kids to vancouver when places on the island would be closer to there home reserves. It was like they were sending them to be the next batch of downtown eastside residents who would be abused evern further by creeps and preditors. Unbelioevable
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Timothy Phillips
5.0 out of 5 stars An important review on the infamy of residential schools
Reviewed in Canada on June 5, 2021
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I was triggered to read this story by the recent discovery of a mass grave containing the bodies of 215 Indigenous children from a residential school in Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada. It's a sad history of the abuse handed down to native youngsters in many residential schools run by religious institutions such as, but not limited to, the Roman Catholic Church. This was done with the complicity of the Canadian government, without whose support this outrage would not have happened. It might be possible to dismiss the use of residential schools in a historical context of something that happened in another century. The truth is that the last school closed as recently as 1996.
Author, Michelle Good is the daughter and granddaughter of survivors who were taken away from family to be brought up in residential schools. Although her story is fictitious, it is a composite of the reality of mistreatment inflicted on so many whose childhood - read this as functional adulthood - was taken away from them. Good has done a superb job of describing how deep run the scars of mistrust and how this has so affected not only those who attended these institutions but perhaps even future generations of their offspring.
Good follows the progress of five involuntary internees from the time of their attendance at a residential school, to their eventual release back into the community, trying to adopt some degree of normalcy but often unable to deal effectively with the trauma of their common experience.
I am still reeling from reading this account but the image will last for a long time.
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notjustyet
5.0 out of 5 stars Read this.
Reviewed in Canada on December 2, 2020
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I think this is an important book for all Canadians (or anyone, really) who doesn't realize the impact the residential schools have had on indigenous people (and still have). It was a heartbreaking, moving read. It was eye opening and makes you think. I couldn't put it down.
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Five Little Indians
by Michelle Good (Goodreads Author)
4.51 · Rating details · 2,740 ratings · 402 reviews
Winner of the 2018 HarperCollins/UBC Prize for Best New Fiction Michelle Good's FIVE LITTLE INDIANS, told from the alternating points of view of five former residential school students as they struggle to survive in 1960s Vancouver—one finding her way into the dangerous world of the American Indian movement; one finding unexpected strength in motherhood; and one unable to escape his demons - and the bonds of friendship that sustain them, inspired by the author's experiences. (less)
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Paperback, 304 pages
Published April 14th 2020 by Harper Perennial
Original TitleFive Little Indians
ISBN1443459194 (ISBN13: 9781443459198)
Literary AwardsScotiabank Giller Prize Nominee (2020), Governor General's Literary Award for Fiction (2020)
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LISTS WITH THIS BOOK
Watching You Without Me by Lynn CoadyFive Little Indians by Michelle GoodDominoes at the Crossroads by Kaie KelloughAll I Ask by Eva CrockerConsent by Annabel Lyon
Giller Prize 2020 Longlist
14 books — 3 voters
Indian Horse by Richard WagameseSplit Tooth by Tanya TagaqJonny Appleseed by Joshua WhiteheadMoon of the Crusted Snow by Waubgeshig RiceSon of a Trickster by Eden Robinson
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127 books — 22 voters
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Carolyn Walsh
Aug 04, 2020Carolyn Walsh rated it really liked it
I believe this is an important book that centres on the horrible systematic abuse native children endured in residential schools. By focusing on the experiences of five children forcibly taken from their families,(which are based on factual accounts), the heart-wrenching experiences should carry a greater emotional impact on Canadians than dry, factual news reports.
The survivors told their stories to investigative panels many years later, and much guilt rests on government policies and religious institutions. The generation of children who survived their years of suffering in these residential schools was emotionally broken from their time held in captivity there, when unable to have contact with their families or community. Their distraught parents were forbidden to visit so they were denied family support and comfort.
Sent out into the outside world with inadequate education and lacking any counselling, financial support, or job placement, many became victims of sex traffickers or fell into drug and alcohol abuse. The aim of these schools was to remove the native culture and language from the children, which occurred under punishing conditions, poor nutrition and inadequate health care. This is a harrowing tale of a dark time in Canadian history. Shameful! (less)
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Dani
Jul 31, 2020Dani rated it it was amazing
Michelle Good is a Cree author from Red Pheasant Cree Nation in Saskatchewan. Her debut novel Five Little Indians follows five residential school survivors in Vancouver as they each grapple with the trauma they were forced to endure in their own ways.
I had a difficult time reading this at first because it was quite triggering. There is some intense substance abuse and sexually traumatic situations in the beginning of the book and for myself this was very difficult to read.
I think anyone with loved ones who were residential school survivors that have passed on would agree that reading novels like this and not being able to hug those loved ones can be very difficult. This is something I also struggled with.
I think these triggers are important to mention and I also think it’s equally important to discuss the brilliant enduring light that is this novel.
Although difficult at first, as Five Little Indians progressed I dreaded it ending because I’d grown to care for each of the characters.
I felt this novel made space for me as an Indigenous woman and leaving seemed daunting. It’s been a little while since I cried actual tears while reading a book but this did it for me.
Many important issues are touched on: how one cannot truly understand the horrors of residential schools unless you’ve attended, the insanity of being released from institutions and being expected to integrate into society healthily without any supports, the ongoing repercussions of colonialism, the power and importance of decolonized love & relationships & ceremony as building blocks for Native Healing.
I want everyone to read this book. I want everyone to bask in its light.
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Jiny S
Apr 24, 2020Jiny S rated it really liked it
The book perfectly captures the plight of Canada’s indigenous population as a product of institutionalized abuse and systemic discrimination by the Canadian government during 60s when Aboriginal children are kidnapped from their families and communities and coerced into an inhumane educational system that is the infamous residential schools. Countless children suffered forced labour, abuse, and even death under the draconian and punitive indoctrination of the churches under the government’s direction. To “kill the Indian in the child” is the vicious objective of faceless institutions, which inevitably killed the child who is herself Indian when everything else is striped from her: her community, her culture, her family, and ultimately her identity.
The book chronicles some memorable characters from the point they start their lives right after they leave the residential school, and enter a strange world where everyone is hostile towards them. Their situation is exacerbated by the fact that they were left without any means of social or financial assistance during the transition to the real world. These young adults do not process the basic skills to survive and attain meaningful employment, and they were given nothing but a bus ticket.
In the beginning of the book, a young girl who is fresh out of residential school encounter a pimp and became his target. Although she is saved, there is no justice nor retribution for the perpetrator. Throughout the book, this kind injustice happens over and over again, in different place with different people who all believe the same thing about Indians. However her story is full of anger, pain, and sadness, it is by no means unique.
It’s always a strange feeling when a place you’ve had a connection to gets mentioned in a book. Most of the time it’s a pound feeling, but not this time.
Once I’ve been to Vancouver for work, I reached out to a friend who lived in the city. He was very nice to me and gave me a tour that included Stanley Park, Granville Islands, and other tourist sites that made me believe all the people who previously told how beautiful Vancouver is as a city. I remembered the mountain, the water, the nice restaurants and seafoods and thought about the incredible real estate prices (the highest in Canada).
As the night came to an end, my friend decided to show me the other side of the town: East Hastings. We drove along the street and I was flabbergasted. People were camping by the side of the street with makeshift tents made of plastic and rags. There are piles of junk and garbage and around a big long line of people. I saw someone injecting himself, right there on the street. As we drove to the end, there were two flashing police cars cordoning off the line of people. What surprised me the most was how close it was to the city, with its nice hotels and restaurants and parks.
There was a snippet of a conversation in the book between a little girl and a bus driver. The bus driver told her: “You should go to East Hastings, that’s where your kinds are.” That made me feel really bad. You can’t feel like that if you haven’t seen what East Hastings is like with your own eyes.
I’m glad for the ending of the book. Despite all the darkness, things got better slowly as the surviving characters seemed to get a foothold in the world. Some of them found each other, rediscovered their roots, fought to bring justice, and slowly started to heal the wounds of the past. The ending was not a shiny vindication, but a slow and quiet healing process that had to gently caress the wounds of all past sufferings.
As I finish this book, I am thankful for the opportunity to learn about this dark chapter in Canada’s history. I’m happy for all the progress that indigenous people have made despite their unspeakable past, and hope that it they and their children will have a better future as times change and attitudes change with it. (less)
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NILTON TEIXEIRA
Oct 19, 2020NILTON TEIXEIRA rated it it was amazing
Shelves: my-5-stars
This is a very well written book and, in my opinion, an excellent debut. It was long listed for the 2020 Scotiabank Giller Prize. It didn’t make the cut for the short list.
At first I was afraid that it was going to tear me apart because some parts are heartbreaking.
There are so many kinds of abuse such as sexual, substance and mental.
I was engaged from the beginning and totally connected with all the characters. The storyline was very well developed without being overly dramatic or repetitive.
The main topic is about young aboriginals taken (kidnapped) from their families and forced to live in a residential school and then, after years of abuse, are simply “released” to freedom with no means or place to live.
It shows how the Canadian government failed to help its own citizens back in the 60’s. (less)
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Glenn Sumi
Jun 17, 2021Glenn Sumi rated it really liked it
Shelves: canadian, indigenous, gov-general-award-winners
A disturbing, revelatory look at survivors of Canada's residential school system
Canada is still reeling from the recent discovery of the remains of 215 Indigenous children who attended a residential school in Kamloops, B.C. That tragedy – which has prompted investigations into other such schools across the country – only hammers home the importance of Michelle Good's prescient and powerful first novel.
It follows the lives of five "survivors" of the Catholic-run Mission school in B.C. I put quotation marks around that word because although these Indigenous children were alive they were irrevocably scarred by the emotional, physical and sexual abuse they suffered at the hands of priests and nuns. They were also cut off from their families and traditions, and so have been largely left without any personal and cultural history.
• Kenny's frequent attempts at escaping the Mission have followed him out into the real world, where he flees any sort of normal life or stability.
• Lucy is a naive girl who's dispatched from the school at 16 and forced to fend for herself without knowing anything about the outside world. She pursues an education as a nurse, and finds meaning in motherhood, even though she's developed some obsessive-compulsive behaviours.
• Maisie, who takes Lucy in when she comes to Vancouver, is tough and knowing on the surface but harbours a deep and dark double life.
• Clara becomes active in the American Indian movement and has built a protective wall around her.
• And finally Howie, probably the most brutally victimized of the lot, has been paying for an impulsive act of vengeance that landed him in jail after leaving the Mission.
Good, who trained later in life as a lawyer and advocated on behalf of many residential-school survivors, focuses not on what happens in the school itself but on what the residents do afterwards. She's especially skillful in depicting the emotional trauma affecting them. Some are haunted by kids who didn't survive, feeling guilt because their friends are dead. Some feel worthless and unmoored, which is how they were made to feel during their stolen childhoods.
And while seeing each other brings solace (only other survivors can understand what they've been through), it can also plunge them back into a time they'd rather forget and move on from.
If the novel has a major flaw, it's that the priests and nuns at the school are cardboard villains, pure evil. I know we're seeing them from the POV of the abused children, but I wish Good had given them a bit more complexity. And the timeline of the childhood scenes is sometimes unclear. (view spoiler). A stronger editor could have cut out some clichés.
The first two or three chapters were unrelenting in their bleakness, and for a while I considered abandoning the novel. (One or two of my Goodreads friends did just that.) I'm glad I stuck with the book, however. Good mixed up the tone of the book, introducing a few other key characters – including a vivacious, life-affirming dog named after one of the 20th century's most important musicians. And she showed us the way to reconciliation and healing.
Five Little Indians is a very important and necessary book, deserving of all the acclaim it's received. (less)
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Bree C.
Jun 20, 2020Bree C. rated it it was amazing
For the briefest of moments I wondered “how could someone come up with such horrors to write about?” and then I of course remembered, this is far too many people’s reality.
I loved this book. I cried when it ended. It is so harrowingly beautiful. It is full of sorrow and strength, and I felt as though there was magic and wisdom woven among the words.
In an unexpected way, it also brought me healing: “You know what Mariah taught me about death? That the only thing our loved ones suffer is when we are suffering here without them.” p. 265
Every Canadian needs to read this book. (less)
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Erin
Sep 12, 2020Erin rated it it was amazing
Shelves: books-i-own
One of the longlist nominees the Scotiabank Giller Prize (a really awesome literary prize here in Canada), Michelle Good tells us the story of 5 fictional characters after their time in a remote Canadian residential school. Written with compassion and without judgment, this definitely is a book that no reader should bypass.
Favorite book of 2020 nominee
Goodreads review published 12/09/20
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Susan Sanford Blades
Nov 20, 2020Susan Sanford Blades rated it liked it
I'm having a hard time figuring out what to say about this book because I really wanted to love it. The effects of the residential schools on Canada's Indigenous people is such an important topic, I wish I could say this novel was the perfect vessel for these stories, but it was not.
My problem with this book is not so much with the plot. Good weaves the stories of five kids after they leave the Mission school on Vancouver Island and the various ways they are affected by and overcome (or not) the trauma they endured while at school as they grow up. Their stories are varied, realistic, and heartbreaking. My problem may be that more attention was not paid to language, imagery, detail, and character. We are shown the effects of trauma but we are not drawn into the heart of it - we are not made to feel how these characters feel, we are only shown how they behave.
It felt at times that sticky situations were gotten out of too easily - unrealistically - that things were shrugged off, and scenes ended with awkward segues punctuated by laughter and cliched dialogue. I wished Good's writing style matched the gritty content of the novel, much like Ashley Little's in Anatomy of a Girl Gang - a novel also told in five voices that takes place in Vancouver's East side and is very real, tough, and raw, and in which each character is given a unique, believable personality and voice.
All that said, I did enjoy reading this book and these stories are important to tell. The characters were all loveable and flawed and we were left with a sense of hope. (less)
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Kat Montagu
Feb 03, 2020Kat Montagu rated it it was amazing
I had a fortunate early opportunity to read this wonderful novel. It is vivid, unique and heartbreaking. I highly recommend both this book and this author. I'll read anything she goes on to write. (less)
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Mélanie Côté
Jan 24, 2021Mélanie Côté rated it really liked it
« We were children, me and Lily, and neither of us survived , even though I’m still walking »- Clara
For this book club read, ‘Five Little Indian’ was a little difficult to read at first, but it captivated me from the very start and I’ve grown to care about the main characters.
This book showed us the brutal reality of Residential School, how this system took (kidnapped) young aboriginals from their families, stripped them off their culture and individuality and tried to mold them to fit society and then « release » them without mean or place to live. It vividly painted a picture of what went down and how it impacted the residents for the rest of their lives; all kinds of abuse where shown. The five characters all have their own issues, bagages and damages.. they all try to escape their past, trying to forget it and move in, but it is clear that its challenging and in some cases, impossible ..
I’ve heard about this topic before, but it was more on the surface and not with this much intensity.. this book made me realize how our government failed its own citizen in the 60’s.
As I complet reading this book, I am thankful to have had the opportunity to learn about a dark time in Canada’s history (thanks to my book club crew). The ending showed a healing process that continues to build; some of them found each other, others rediscovers their roots while some fought for justice.
4.5 (less)
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Penny (Literary Hoarders)
Jul 31, 2020Penny (Literary Hoarders) rated it it was amazing
Shelves: 20-books-of-summer, books-read-in-2020, giller-prize, canlit, shadow-giller, from-windsor-public-library, library
It took me only two days to read this. I spent my day entirely reading this today. I will miss my time with these "five little Indians". I was fully invested in their stories.
The Vatican and the Canadian government need to pony up large to perhaps come even close to rectify the pain, the suffering, and the torture and the lifelong trauma caused from these horrible Residential Schools. The ironclad collaboration between the Church, the Government and the RCMP made me cry when I thought of these (beginning at 6-year-old) kids and all they endured and the pain that they spend a lifetime trying to overcome caused by the filthy hands of these horrible, terrible people.
This is the first CanLit book I'm reading from the 2020 Crazy for CanLit titles that could make the Giller Prize's Longlist - to be announced in September. This is only the first I've read from the eligible list but it has left a mark and will haunt me for a very long time. I am very interested to see if the jurors feel the same. (less)
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Shawn Mooney (Shawn The Book Maniac)
Sep 24, 2020Shawn Mooney (Shawn The Book Maniac) marked it as did-not-finish · review of another edition
Shelves: did-not-finish-2020
As a settler Canadian, I am so glad this book exists and is being nominated for big prizes. Unfortunately, it didn’t work at all for me, due to the writing and especially the naïve, faux Dickensian characterization. I couldn’t finish it. But check out the other, glowing reviews: I’m in a distinct minority.
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Sarah
Jul 06, 2020Sarah rated it really liked it
Shelves: bipoc, under-20-bookclub, 2020, canadian-author
At the age of 16, after aging out of a Northern BC Residential school, the Indigenous youth in Five Little Indians were not, at long last, reunited with their families. They were put on a bus to Vancouver with a few bucks and no support, no life skills, no connections, no ID. This is where Five Little Indians begins. The trauma the characters endure, both in flashbacks to the school and as they struggle to build a life in the city, is no longer shocking. That doesn’t make it any less horrific and heartbreaking. There are a couple scenes that made me cry. The characters stories each take unique paths as they connect and re-connect with each other over decades. Each victory is hard won and every set back is handled with empathy. The subject matter is dark but the writing style is straight forward and accessible for non-Indigenous readers.
Author, Michelle Good has dedicated her career to helping Indigenous clients through the bureaucracy of the Canadian legal system, eventually getting her law degree. Her mother and grandmother attended residential school. I feel that Kenny, Clara, Maisie, Lucy and Howie are compilations of real survivors Michelle has known and that their stories answer to those who still say “why can’t they just get over it?”.
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Rainer F
Sep 19, 2020Rainer F rated it it was amazing
Michelle Good's debut novel is longlisted for the Scotiabank Giller Prize and it could really win it. Five Little Indians is a heartbreaking account of five young First Nation kids who were kidnapped from their parents and taken into a residential school, the inhumane, criminal official policies in Canada with the purpose "to kill the Indian in the child". The last of these "schools" was shut down as late as 1996.
Thousand of children died, almost all of the kids who were taken away from their families without any contact to their parents suffer from PTSD and went through a living hell.
Michelle Good describes the inhumanity and the suffering by telling the story of her five main characters over two and a half decades. The characters are authentic, their stories seem more than real and I wonder if the author has drawn from her own experience as a legal counsellor for First Nation people who have suffered through residential schools. The Canadian federal government has apologized for the unfair treatment - an apology for the martyrdom of thens of thousands of people sounds shallow and does not mean anything.
This book made me angry and sad and there are parts where you ball your eyes out. Great literature. Well done.
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Kim
Oct 06, 2020Kim rated it it was amazing · review of another edition
Shelves: canadian, indigenous-voices
The Story:
Taken from their families when they are very small and sent to a remote, church-run residential school, Kenny, Lucy, Clara, Howie and Maisie are barely out of childhood when they are finally released after years of detention.
Alone and without any skills, support or families, the teens find their way to the seedy and foreign world of Downtown Eastside Vancouver, where they cling together, striving to find a place of safety and belonging in a world that doesn’t want them. The paths of the five friends cross and crisscross over the decades as they struggle to overcome, or at least forget, the trauma they endured during their years at the Mission.
The Experience
I have read and heard much about the shameful history of treatment of indigenous people in residential schools. Canadians also have a shameful history of bad treatment of indigenous people outside of the residential schools. But this story isn’t a history lesson; indigenous people are STILL treated shamefully everyday in this country.
Five Little Indians is a beautifully written book. The prose is simple, the stories are not. Kenny, Lucy, Clara, Howie and Maisie each carry the scars of their childhood into a society that claimed to have ripped them from their family so that they could better assimilate into “Canadian culture,” but instead left them damaged and outcast. And although this book is filled with sorrow, pain, injustice, abuse and tragedy, there is also so much love, strength, community, and resilience.
I would hope everyone would read this book and others like it, because the last residential school may have closed in 1996, but the heavy legacy will continue for generations. And closing those “schools” did nothing to end systemic racism. We have a responsibility as human beings, to, at the very minimum, listen to indigenous writers, to hear the stories, and respect the voices. Racism flourishes in ignorance. (less)
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Christie Menzo
Dec 01, 2020Christie Menzo rated it it was amazing
Excellent book - couldn't put it down once I started. With compassion, heart, and tremendous strength, Good tells the story of 5 residential school survivors and the challenging paths their lives take post their time in the schooling system. As a Vancouver resident, the proximity of this book and the characters to home hit me hard. This is one I can see winning Canada Reads..or Vancouver reads in the near future. (less)
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Eva
Mar 11, 2020Eva rated it it was amazing
Michelle Good has written a heart rending story of loss, trauma, and belonging. After a long and appalling ordeal at a residential school, the characters are thrown out into the world with little money or opportunity and expected to survive. Many end up in the downtown Eastside of Vancouver, a harsh and dangerous environment for an innocent young person. It doesn’t take long for the women in particular to be taken advantage of in different ways. There is support for some via the Friendship Centre, a gathering place for people of indigenous heritage to support one another and maintain their ceremonial and cultural practices. It is also a space where one of the characters, Clara, learns and becomes involved in the American Indian Movement. Harsh realities of poverty, incarceration and addiction are taken on and show the very real and painful imbalance of indigenous people in these populations.
Good has written very realistic characters no doubt contrived through her own experiences as a Cree person and a lawyer who lived in Vancouver. Despite the sadness I felt for much of the book, the author has managed to write an uplifting ending which made me feel a special warmth for the characters.
Books like this one are important write and to read. We need to learn in order to do better.
Five Little Indians publishes April 14, 2020 by @HarperCollinsCa . I received an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review. (less)
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