I got this as an arc on Netgalley and it will come out next month. This was heartbreakingly good and absolutely destroyed me. It's such an important book about ICWA, Indian Child Welfare Act, that I cannot stress enough how important this read is. Please check the trigger warnings thoroughly before starting.

If I could give this book six stars, I would.

It starts off slow, as our main character Lucy Smith meets Daunis and Jamie (from the author's previous book Firekeeper's Daughter) and finds out more about her birth mother and the Ojibwe culture. As the story progresses, we get flashbacks to Lucy's childhood growing up with her father and then in foster care, until it all comes together in a finale that had me sobbing like a baby.

It was also eye-opening, partly in terms of the foster care system in the US but primarily in teaching me more about the Indian Child Welfare Act.

A recommended read for fans of Angeline Boulley and raw stories of human life.

Thank you to NetGalley and OneWorld Publications for providing me with a digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Sisters in the Wind by Angeline Boulley is possibly her best and easily her most heartbreaking book to date.Set between The Firekeeper's Daughter and Warrior Girl Unearthed the book tells the story of Lucy, a young girl who never knew her mother and wound up in foster care following the death of her father. Cycling from one foster home to another until she ends up in one that is so bad that she has no option but to run away she has grown used to a life on the run until one day when a stranger, Jamie walks into the diner where she works and reveals more about her past than she had ever been able to uncover before. However before she can take him up onhis offer shadows from the past come back to haunt her and before she can flee she finds heself hospitalised, or as she sees it trapped with Jamie and his not quite friend Daunis while she recovers. Will she learn to trust them enough to reveal the dangers from her past that still threaten her today? Will she embrace her culture and the family that would love to welcome her back? The journey will not be an easy one, but I was riveted every step of the way.
This book captivated me, I read the whole thing over the course of a few hours because I simply could not put it down. Lucy is such a broken character, worn down by all the terrible things that have happened to her that it is impossible not to root for her, despite her making every effort to keep people at arm's length. The author uses dual timelines extremely effectively to show the reader just what makes Lucy the way she is, but that in turn allows us to rejoice every time that she lets her walls down even a little. The characters of Daunis and Jamie will be familiar with readers who have read the previous books and getting to spend more time with them here was a real highlight for me, but I also think that readers who are new to the author and pick up this book coulld still enjoy it completely, it could work as a standalone though I would definitely recommend reading at least Firekeeper's Daughter first. I also think Boulley is masterful in the way she teased out what happened in Lucy's past and why she was on the run. Very early on we learn that she is hiding from someone but we do not know the specifics of who or why for most of the book, and I was so intrigued by what was going on that it was another reason why I did not want to put the book down.
Now for the hard stuff, this book does not shy away from darker topics, though it is difficult to get into specifics without spoiling the plot of the book. If I could sum it up in one quote it would be
“The ultimate survival game is for girls to survive into adulthood. For the prey to avoid the predators. It’s a wry thought that turns somber when I remember my sister. Some girls don’t survive.”
However there is light to balance the darkness, the author spends time discussing the need to allow people , including oneself, to be imperfect and know that they are still worthy of loving and being loved. The importance of community , heritage and family is clear on every page . I have rarely found myself getting emotional while reading but I will admit that the ending of this book broke my heart, I had to stop for a moment and then turn back the page to make sure I had read correctly, so be warned you may need some tissues on standby.
I read an ARC courtesy of NetGalley and the publisher, all opinions are my own.