Mercifully, the book does not spend too much time in the residential school, the kids are ‘out’ of it fairly close to the beginning of the book, but I include the word in quotations because sadly, they can never really escape what was done to them there. Because these characters attended residential school in the 60s and 70s its easy to dismiss this as a long ago problem, but I will remind my readers that the last residential school didn’t close in Canada until 1996, so unfortunately the trauma these schools inflicted on people are still very much in the present for many people. Their paths do cross again, each sharing a version of trauma that most don’t understand, even other Indigenous people who were spared from the residential school experience. The narrative follows each character separately, weaving in and out of their lives, not always in a linear fashion. We spend a brief period of time with them while at the school, learning how they either escaped, or aged out of it, but the majority of the book focuses on their time as adults, most of them living in the seedy Eastside of Vancouver. Kenny, Lucy, Clara, Howie and Maisie are Indigenous children taken away from their parents, and forced into an isolated residential school on the coast of British Columbia in the late 1960s. Not surprisingly I loved it, but I can’t say I was shocked by any of its contents, as someone who has been reading Indigenous literature for years, it included things I’ve been well aware of for over a decade.

Not only that, my followers on social media have insisted this book is a must-read, so I finally purchased a copy a few weeks ago and read it over the course of three days.

Five Little Indians by Michelle Good has been nominated or won virtually every Canadian literary award possible, and just last week won the the Canada Reads competition. But every so often I break out of this pattern and pick up a classic book that I’ve been dying to read, or in this case, a book that’s won so many awards, it feels simply wrong to have not read it by now.

I won’t say my reading is influenced by awards, because it rarely is – quite often, my book choices depend on the themes I’ve come up with for my monthly radio segment, and the books that land on my doorstep for review.

Michelle good five little indians